Geology News

November 20, 2024

Top Headlines

Study Challenges Long-Held Theories on How Migratory Birds Navigate

Nov. 12, 2024 — Migratory birds are known for their ability to traverse thousands of kilometres to reach their breeding or wintering grounds. Research found that these birds, in this case, Eurasian reed warblers (Acrocephalus scirpaceus) are using only the Earth's ...

Sliding Seeds Can Provide Insight Into Devastating Landslides and Rock Avalanches

Nov. 19, 2024 — Researchers study how Champatis roll and bounce down inclines. The authors released a heap of the seeds down an inclined plane while a camera recorded their descent to analyze their speed and the ...

How 70% of the Mediterranean Sea Was Lost 5.5 Million Years Ago

Nov. 18, 2024 — A new study has highlighted just how significantly the level of the Mediterranean Sea dropped during the Messinian Salinity Crisis -- a major geological event that transformed the Mediterranean into a gigantic salt basin between 5.97 and 5.33 ...

New Research Explores Volcanic Caves, Advancing the Search for Life on Mars

Nov. 18, 2024 — Through the intricate study of lava tubes -- caves formed following volcanic eruptions when lava cools down -- an international team of researchers has uncovered clues about Earth's ancient environments that could be significant in the search for ...

Latest Headlines

updated 11:21pm EST

Scientists Compile Library for Evaluating Exoplanet Water

Nov. 14, 2024 — By probing chemical processes observed in the Earth's hot mantle, scientists have started developing a library of basalt-based spectral signatures that not only will help reveal the composition of ...

Spectacular Chimneys Discovered in the Dead Sea

Nov. 14, 2024 — Researchers have discovered meter-high chimneys on the floor of the Dead Sea. These are formed by the spontaneous crystallization of minerals from groundwater with an extremely high salt content ...

Was 'Snowball Earth' a Global Event? Study Delivers Best Proof Yet

Nov. 11, 2024 — A series of rocks hiding around Colorado's Rocky Mountains may hold clues to a frigid period in Earth's past when glaciers several miles thick covered the entire ...

Geologists Rewrite Textbooks With New Insights from the Bottom of the Grand Canyon

Nov. 8, 2024 — Geoscientists employed current-day stratigraphic, depositional and paleontological models, along with modern technological muscle to provide updated ...

Pioneering Planetary Boundaries Science as Key to Mitigating Rising Planetary Risks

Nov. 8, 2024 — The Planetary Boundaries framework is a pivotal tool for tackling the climate crisis and safeguarding humanity's future on Earth. For the first time, ...

Groundbreaking Study Provides New Evidence of When Earth Was Slushy

Nov. 5, 2024 — At the end of the last global ice age, the deep-frozen Earth reached a built-in limit of climate change and thawed into a slushy planet. Results provide the first direct geochemical evidence of the ...

Reconstructing Ancient Climate Provides Clues to Climate Change

Nov. 4, 2024 — Research helps reconstruct an ancient climate and challenges the timing of the Andes Mountains ...

New Trigger Proposed for Record-Smashing 2022 Tonga Eruption

Nov. 4, 2024 — Fifteen minutes before the massive January 2022 eruption of the Hunga Tonga-Hunga Ha'apai volcano, a seismic wave was recorded by two distant seismic stations. The researchers propose that the ...

Buried Alive: Carbon Dioxide Release from Magma Deep Beneath Ancient Volcanoes Was a Hidden Driver of Earth's Past Climate

Oct. 30, 2024 — A team discovered that, contrary to present scientific understanding, ancient volcanoes continued to spew carbon dioxide into the atmosphere from ...

How Life Began on Earth: Modeling Earth's Ancient Atmosphere

Oct. 31, 2024 — This model reveals how vastly different the atmosphere was on ancient Earth, and how life may have first ...

'Drowning Continent': Western Australian Coastline's Complex History

Oct. 22, 2024 — A study investigating the complex evolution of two iconic Western Australian landmarks, has traced their transformation over thousands of years and offers a glimpse into their future. Researchers ...

What Happened When a Meteorite the Size of Four Mount Everests Hit Earth?

Oct. 21, 2024 — Scientists paint a compelling picture of what happened the day the S2 meteorite crashed into Earth 3.26 billion years ...

Weather-Changing El Nino Oscillation Is at Least 250 Million Years Old

Oct. 21, 2024 — A new modeling study shows that the El Nino event, a huge blob of warm ocean water in the tropical Pacific Ocean that can change rainfall patterns around the globe, was present at least 250 million ...

Shaking from April's Sizable New Jersey Earthquake Traveled Strangely Far

Oct. 21, 2024 — When a magnitude 4.8 earthquake struck northern New Jersey's Tewksbury township on April 5, it triggered widespread alarm as the biggest event since 1884. Based on existing models, it should ...

Understanding Landslides: A New Model for Predicting Motion

Oct. 17, 2024 — Along coastal California, the possibility of earthquakes and landslides are commonly prefaced by the phrase, 'not if, but when.' This precarious reality is now a bit more predictable thanks ...

Echoes from the Past: A Geological Mystery Unravelled on Easter Island

Oct. 16, 2024 — A mysterious find on Easter Island, investigated by a team of geologists, suggests that the Earth's mantle seems to behave differently than once ...

Lightning Strikes Kick Off a Game of Electron Pinball in Space

Oct. 10, 2024 — When lightning cracks on Earth, especially high-energy electrons may fall out of Earth's inner radiation belt, according to a new study -- an electron 'rain' that could threaten ...

Nanostructures in the Deep Ocean Floor Hint at Life's Origin

Oct. 3, 2024 — Researchers have discovered inorganic nanostructures surrounding deep-ocean hydrothermal vents that are strikingly similar to molecules that make life as we know it possible. These nanostructures are ...

Iron Nuggets in the Pinnacles Unlock Secrets of Ancient and Future Climates

Oct. 2, 2024 — Small iron-rich formations found within Western Australia's Pinnacles, which are part of the world's largest wind-blown limestone belt spanning more than 1000km, have provided new insights ...

Mystery of Uruguay's Amethyst Geodes: New Model to Explain Amethyst Formation

Oct. 2, 2024 — Amethyst is a violet variety of quartz which has been used as a gemstone for many centuries and is a key economic resource in northern Uruguay. Geodes are hollow rock formations often with quartz ...

Closer Look at New Jersey Earthquake Rupture Could Explain Shaking Reports

Oct. 2, 2024 — Geologists show how the earthquake's rupture direction may have affected who felt the strongest shaking on 5 ...

Tongan Volcanic Eruption Triggered by Explosion as Big as 'Five Underground Nuclear Bombs'

Sep. 30, 2024 — The Hunga Tonga underwater volcano was one of the largest volcanic eruptions in history, and now, two years later, new research has revealed its main ...

A River Is Pushing Up Mount Everest's Peak

Sep. 30, 2024 — Mount Everest is about 15 to 50 meters taller than it would otherwise be because of uplift caused by a nearby eroding river gorge, and continues to grow because of ...

Deep Underground Flooding Beneath Arima Hot Springs: A Potential Trigger for the 1995 Kobe (Hyogo-Ken Nanbu) Earthquake

Sep. 27, 2024 — Researchers showed that the 1995 Kobe (Hyogo-ken Nanbu) earthquake, which struck southern Hyogo Prefecture, may have been triggered by deep underground flooding beneath Arima Hot Springs. By ...

Ancient Sunken Seafloor Reveals Earth's Deep Secrets

Sep. 27, 2024 — Geologists discover a mysterious subduction zone deep beneath the Pacific Ocean, reshaping our understanding of Earth's ...

Extinct Volcanoes a 'Rich' Source of Rare Earth Elements

Sep. 24, 2024 — A mysterious type of iron-rich magma entombed within extinct volcanoes is likely abundant with rare earth elements and could offer a new way to source these in-demand metals, according to new ...

Extreme Polar Light Environment of the North and South Poles Sustains Biodiversity

Sep. 23, 2024 — Researchers working in Finland propose that the unique light environment of the Earth's Polar regions creates conditions that result in circumpolar hybrid zones around the North and the South ...

Over Nearly Half a Billion Years, Earth's Global Temperature Has Changed Drastically, Driven by Carbon Dioxide

Sep. 19, 2024 — A new study offers the most detailed glimpse yet into how Earth's surface temperature has changed over the past 485 million years. The data show that Earth has been and can be warmer than today ...

New Research Reenvisions Earth's Mantle as a Relatively Uniform Reservoir

Sep. 19, 2024 — Lavas from hotspots - -whether erupting in Hawaii, Samoa or Iceland -- likely originate from a worldwide, uniform reservoir in Earth's mantle, according to an evaluation of volcanic ...

Explaining Dramatic Planet-Wide Changes After World's Last 'Snowball Earth' Event

Sep. 18, 2024 — Some of the most dramatic climatic events in our planet's history are 'Snowball Earth' events that happened hundreds of millions of years ago, when almost the entire planet was encased ...