Woods Hole, Mass. – The overlapping effects of sea level rise, permafrost thaw subsidence, and erosion may lead to land loss in Arctic coastal regions that dwarfs the land loss from any single one of these climate hazards, scientists say. While 75 years of aerial and satellite observations have established coastal erosion as an increasing […]
King salmon have sustained people in Alaska for at least 12,000 years, but over the past three decades their populations have begun to dwindle. Researchers at the University of Alaska Fairbanks linked these declines to reduced body size and extreme climate conditions in the ocean and in rivers. Their study, published in October by Global Change […]
For the fourth consecutive year, University of Alaska Fairbanks scientist Rick Thoman served as an editor of an annual federal report summarizing the world’s climate. “State of the Climate in 2023” describes global environmental conditions and highlights notable climate records. For example, Earth’s greenhouse gas concentrations, ocean heat and global sea level were the highest on […]
Arctic conditions that dominated in the preindustrial Bering Sea are expected to continue to decline over the next 1-2 decades. NOAA Fisheries scientists attribute the abrupt collapse of snow crab in Alaska to borealization, or an ecological shift from Arctic to sub-Arctic conditions in the southeastern Bering Sea due to human-caused climate change. Cold-adapted species […]