Atmospheric

Greenhouse Gases And Water Vapor: When 'Positive Feedback' Is A Bad Thing

Observations and climate model results confirm that human-induced warming of the planet is having a pronounced effect on the atmosphere’s total moisture content. “When you heat the planet, you increase the ability of the atmosphere to hold moisture,” said ...

Article - News Staff - Sep 18 2007 - 3:25pm

'Incomplete Degassing' Theory Of Atmospheric Formation Gets New Support

Scientists believe that shortly after Earth was formed, it had a glowing surface of molten rock extending down hundreds of miles. As that surface cooled, a rigid crust was produced near the surface and solidified slowly downward to complete the now-solid p ...

Article - News Staff - Sep 19 2007 - 6:49pm

Next Global Warming Threat: Laughing Gas (It's Not A Joke)

The growth and conversion of biofuel crops could raise rather than lower greenhouse gas emissions, says a new study led by Nobel prize-winning chemist Paul Crutzen, best known for his work on the ozone layer. He and his colleagues have calculated that grow ...

Article - News Staff - Sep 21 2007 - 11:27am

Air Reconsidered: Now 100 Million Years Before The Great Oxidation Event

An international team of researchers has determined there was a "whiff" of oxygen in Earth's atmosphere about 2.5 billion years ago, the earliest time any significant amount of oxygen has been detected on Earth. Up to now, scholars believed ...

Article - News Staff - Sep 27 2007 - 6:10pm

IPCC Reviewer: Greenhouse Gases Did Not End The Last Ice Age

Deep-sea temperatures rose 1,300 years before atmospheric CO2, ruling out the greenhouse gas as the driver of the meltdown, says a new study. “There has been this continual reference to the correspondence between CO2 and climate change as reflected in ice ...

Article - News Staff - Sep 27 2007 - 6:23pm

Origin Of Earth's Adenine May Point To How Life Could Exist Elsewhere, Says Chemist

Some of the elements necessary to support life on Earth are widely known- oxygen, carbon and water, to name a few. Just as important in the existence of life as any other component is the presence of adenine, an essential organic molecule. Without it, the ...

Article - News Staff - Oct 2 2007 - 12:53pm

Exotic Carbon Dioxide Molecule May Add To Greenhouse Effect On Venus

Planetary scientists on both sides of the Atlantic have tracked down a rare molecule in the atmospheres of both Mars and Venus. The molecule, an exotic form of carbon dioxide, could affect the way the greenhouse mechanism works on Venus. The discovery is b ...

Article - News Staff - Oct 11 2007 - 10:31am

Alaska, California, Might Have The Most Mercury Emissions From Forest Fires- Or Not

A new paper estimates that fires in the continental United States and Alaska release about 44 metric tons of mercury into the atmosphere every year. It is the first study to estimate mercury emissions for each state, based on a new computer model developed ...

Article - News Staff - Oct 17 2007 - 1:08pm

The Origin Of "Breathable" Atmosphere On Earth

Geologists have uncovered evidence of when Earth may have first supported an oxygen-rich atmosphere similar to the one we breathe today. The study suggests that upheavals in the earth’s crust initiated a kind of reverse-greenhouse effect 500 million years ...

Article - News Staff - Oct 29 2007 - 12:34am

'Windprofilers' Help Understand The Ozone Role In Pollution

Atmospheric scientists are just about the only group that doesn't have a crime drama on television but that may change. In every crime drama there needs to be a victim, in this case the atmosphere, and we might have a part-time criminal in ozone. Ther ...

Article - News Staff - Nov 8 2007 - 11:38am