Add another species to the list of organisms oozing over Alaska. A tiny gnat — one that in its larval stage sometimes crawls over its brethren’s backs in great numbers until together they resemble a long gray snake — is a newly described species. Alaska insect expert Derek Sikes and postdoctoral researcher Thalles Pereira from […]
Two-hundred and forty-one years ago, when Gen. George Washington marched back into New York City as British troops were walking out, a volcano erupted in Iceland. For eight months of 1783, Laki volcano spewed lava and belched noxious fumes into the atmosphere. One quarter of the residents of Iceland died, and the sulfur-rich gases that […]
A person is bound to notice changes if he bicycles the same pathways for 20 years. Such is the case in San Francisco, where the Fall Meeting of the American Geophysical Union was held last week, as it has been for many Decembers. Some observations: 1. People are really happy to get together again after […]
SAN FRANCISCO — In December 2006, I sat in a similar carpeted room in this city and listened to scientists talk about an Alaska-size chunk of sea ice that was no longer floating on the northern oceans compared to previous years. That meant that the “refrigerator of the northern hemisphere” was much less powerful than […]