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Early Earth is often described as ‘Hadean’ for good reason. Arising from the ashes of a collision that gave us our Moon, the primordial eon was characterized by hellish heat trapped beneath a thick blanket of carbon dioxide and water vapor. Strangely those conditions should have been inhospitable for far longer than they were. … Read more
Planting trillions of trees won’t replace the 10 million hectares of forest ecosystems lost each year, but documenting them could prevent further losses Environment | Comment 2 March 2022 By Jingjing Liang Michelle D’urbano SINCE the 13th century, forests have been managed as sources of trees that can be processed into timber. More recently, with … Read more
By Adam Vaughan People walking by the ruins of the village of Vilar PAULO NOVAIS/EPA-EFE/Shutterstock This is Fix the Planet, the weekly climate change newsletter that reminds you there are reasons for hope in science and technology around the world. To receive it in your inbox, sign up here. It may have been overshadowed by Russia’s … Read more
The batteries we need to power the transition to 100-per-cent renewable electricity require rare metals, and that means destructive mining – but researchers are working on alternatives Technology 2 March 2022 By Katharine Sanderson Graham Carter If we are going to stop burning fossil fuels, it is critical that we have access to electricity from … Read more
A new telescope taking on the task of staring at the Sun has delivered incredible new images of solar activity. The US National Science Foundation’s Daniel K. Inouye Solar Telescope commenced science operations for the first time on Wednesday 23 February 2022. It’s the largest solar telescope in the world, and its high-resolution observations of … Read more
Ceres might be spewing cryovolcanoes in yet another spot on the dwarf planet’s surface. Close-up pictures from NASA’s Dawn mission that orbited Ceres between 2015 and 2018 revealed salt deposits in a crater known as Urvara, spotted for the first time in a new study. The salt deposits may be associated with icy volcanoes, the … Read more
Not all planetary systems are alike. Out there in the big, wide galaxy, a number of different configurations have been spotted, some vastly different from our home system. These include extrasolar planets, or exoplanets, that orbit not one, but two stars, like the fictional Star Wars world of Tatooine. Now, for the first time, astronomers … Read more
Why climate action will require both societal and behavioural change to be effective Environment 24 February 2022 By Adam Vaughan Prof. Paul Ekins ,UCL answers questions from delegates during a panel session with Fernanda Balata and Modi Mwatsama Richard Stonehouse/Getty Images This is Fix the Planet, the weekly climate change newsletter that reminds you there … Read more
A ground-based telescope’s detection of a known Tatooine-like planet could herald new discoveries of similar planets, researchers say. Observers spotted Kepler-16b — an exoplanet that orbits two stars, similar to a world portrayed in the original series of “Star Wars” — using a relatively modest 75-inch (193-centimeter) telescope. The telescope is situated at Observatoire de … Read more
For decades a global economic system based on the conversion of nature into profit has been accelerating inequality, environmental destruction and climate change. Hundreds of millions of people are vulnerable to (seemingly) natural disasters, including pandemics caused by the emergence of novel pathogens. By exacerbating xenophobic nationalism and precipitating vaccine apartheid, COVID-19 has intensified these … Read more