Droughts can grip the vast Sahel region of Africa for decades, dramatically altering the border where forest and savannahs give way to the Sahara Desert. Predicting those droughts is vital, but hard.

On Nov. 29 Tropical Cyclone Dahlia became the first tropical cyclone of the 2017-2018 Southwest Indian Ocean season. The Global Precipitation Measurement Mission or GPM core satellite provided forecasters with a look inside the clouds and into the rate rain was falling. Heavy rainfall has created the potential for landslides and NASA analyzed areas that may be subject.

When NASA's Aqua satellite passed over Tropical Storm Ockhi, it measured cloud top temperatures that showed strongest storms were off the coast of southwestern India. Infrared data showed Ockhi intensifing into a typhoon.

When we sleep, our organism goes through different phases of sleep, however the brain remains interconnected during non-REM sleep, which was thought not to happen. The finding by a European team of researchers has also made it possible to analyse the scientific basis of consciousness, an increasingly important field of neuroscience.

One of Africa’s last remaining wilderness areas is in good shape and could potentially support 50,000 elephants and 1000 lions, a University of Queensland-led study has found.

Tokyo - Roof-mounted solar panels are an increasingly common sight in many places. As a source of cheap, clean electricity, their advantages are obvious. However, most solar panels are opaque, and therefore cannot be placed over windows. Now, researchers at The University of Tokyo's Institute of Industrial Science (IIS) have made developments in the design of transparent solar materials.

Endocrine disrupting chemicals (EDCs) are associated with a number of possible health issues.

EDCs are mostly produced by humans. They’re found in all sorts of things from pesticides and herbicides, and from cropland and livestock waste effluents and municipal and industrial waste to personal care products.

The direct oxidation of methane—found in natural gas—into methanol at low temperatures has long been a holy grail. Now, researchers at Tufts have found a breakthrough way to accomplish the feat using a heterogeneous catalyst and cheap molecular oxygen, according to a paper published today in the journal Nature by a team led by Tufts University chemical engineers.

A new study of methane emissions from livestock in the United States — led by a researcher in Penn State's College of Agricultural Sciences — has challenged previous top-down estimates.

Active components on buildings such as blinds whose design was copied from naturally occurring solutions — that is the subject of the research conducted by a team from the Technical University of Munich (TUM), the University of Freiburg, and the University of Stuttgart. The aim is to equip them with drive elements that can move without any electrical energy input. Serving as a model here are conifer pine cones, which utilize the varying swelling behaviors of their tissue to open when moist or close when dry.