Every Wednesday, we’re asking a what-if question – how would our world be different if something were changed? Today’s question is from QSFer Scott: What happens if all the ice at the poles melts? Inspired by this article: Vanishing ice is warping Earth’s crust Share your serious scientific analyses, your off-color jokes, and random thoughts on the topic on our FB and MeWe Groups: FB: http://bit.ly/1MvPABV MeWe: http://bit.ly/2mjg8lf
Ice is stiff and brittle — if you bend it, it will snap in two. Right? Not quite. Researchers just found that when grown in tiny strands, ice can defy its reputation for breakability, becoming so elastic it can even bend into a loop, according to a new study. These ice microfibers are so bendy that they are near the theoretical limit for ice elasticity. Perhaps even cooler, the scientists who grew the bendy ice think that their teensy ice strands could lead to both an avalanche of new ways to better understand ice in its natural state and more … Read more
NASA astronomers just shared a colorful new view of Mars that proves the Red Planet also looks great in blue. Using a special infrared camera aboard the Mars Odyssey orbiter, which has been soaring over the Red Planet since 2001, researchers snapped a thermal image of the Martian north pole, digitally colored to highlight the wide-ranging temperatures there. Areas tinted in blue represent colder regions, while warmer areas are tinted in yellow and orange, according to a NASA statement. In this image — which covers an area of the pole about 19 miles (30 kilometers) wide — vast sand dunes … Read more
Scientists have identified the 19th form of water ice. The exotic, four-sided crystals of this rare ice variety, now dubbed ice XIX, form at ultra-low temperatures and ultra-high pressures. It only exists in laboratory experiments, but researchers say it reveals more about other forms of ice, which can be found deep in the Earth’s mantle and on very cold planets and moons. “To name a new ice form, one needs to elucidate exactly what the crystal structure is,” said lead researcher Thomas Loerting, a professor of physical chemistry at the University of Innsbruck in Austria. That means figuring out the … Read more
The Arctic Ocean was once a pool of fresh water capped with an ice shelf half as thick as the Grand Canyon is deep. If that’s hard to envision, don’t despair. Scientists were surprised at the discovery, published Wednesday (Feb. 3) in the journal Nature, as well. The trick to envisioning this odd arrangement is to think about the relationship between ice sheets and the ocean. When ice sheets melt, they dump water into the ocean, raising the sea level. But when ice sheets grow, as they have during Earth’s glacial periods, sea level drops. Now, new research shows that … Read more
Early Mars may not have been quite the warm, wet paradise scientists have hoped for — not if the valleys scarring its surface work the same way as their counterparts here on Earth do. That’s the conclusion of new research that tried to suss out what the Red Planet really looked like during its first billion years by analyzing more than 10,000 segments of valleys on Mars. In particular, the scientists were inspired by the look of Devon Island in the Canadian Arctic, which is dry and frigid. According to the new analysis, some Martian valleys may have been formed … Read more
Could Mercury’s close orbit around the sun help the planet generate ice? It sounds like a paradox, but new analysis of the planet’s surface chemistry suggests that heat-generated ice may indeed be the case. Even though daytime temperatures on Mercury soar to 750 degrees Fahrenheit (400 degrees Celsius), ice can occur in craters sheltered from the sun. There, the surface is exposed to cold space at about minus 330 F (minus 200 C). We’ve known about this ice for almost a decade thanks to observations from NASA’s now-defunct MESSENGER (Mercury Surface, Space Environment, Geochemistry and Ranging) spacecraft. But the explanation … Read more
Periodically we share the latest climate change news with you. Today we’re covering fires in Australia, a methane leak in Ohio, and lots of melting ice. Natural Gas Blowout in Ohio Released Huge Amounts of MethaneIn February 2018, a blowout at a natural gas well in rural Ohio forced nearby residents to evacuate, but the incident received little national attention at the time. A new analysis of satellite data shows that the leak was far more significant than previously thought. In just 20 days, the damaged well platform spewed an estimated 60 kilotons of the potent planet-warming gas methane into … Read more
Here are some of the latest climate change stories to keep you up-to-date: Greenland Loses 11 Billion Tons of Ice – In One DayAfter months of record temperatures, scientists say Greenland’s ice sheet experienced its biggest melt of the summer on Thursday, losing 11 billion tons of surface ice to the ocean — equivalent to 4.4 million Olympic swimming pools. Greenland’s ice sheet usually melts during the summer, but the melt season typically begins around the end of May; this year it began at the start. It has been melting “persistently” over the past four months, which have recorded all time … Read more
There’s a giant trove of frozen methane, or “fire ice,” locked beneath our ocean’s surface. If released, it could trigger tsunamis, landslides and release huge amounts of carbon into our already-warming atmosphere. But we have almost no idea how much there is or where to find it. That’s in part because frozen methane on our planet takes many more forms than we previously thought, and we are only now beginning to recognize some of them, Ann Cook, an associate professor in the School of Earth Sciences at The Ohio State University said during a presentation yesterday (June 25) here at … Read more