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Supervolcanic Ash Can Turn To Lava Miles From Eruption, MU Scientists Find

By Guest PostSeptember 6, 2013Sciencepyroclastic flows, supervolcano eruption, supervolcanoes, viscous heating, volcanic ash, volcanic eruptions

“Viscous heating” can reheat volcanic ash enough to convert it to lava

COLUMBIA, Mo. — Supervolcanoes, such as the one sitting dormant under Yellowstone National Park, are capable of producing eruptions thousands of times more powerful than normal volcanic eruptions. While they only happen every several thousand years, these eruptions have the potential to kill millions of people and animals due to the massive amount of heat and ash they release into the atmosphere. Now, researchers at the University of Missouri have shown that the ash produced by supervolcanoes can be so hot that it has the ability to turn back into lava once it hits the ground tens of miles away from the original eruption. (more…)

Roman Seawater Concrete Holds the Secret to Cutting Carbon Emissions

By Guest PostJune 24, 2013Scienceals, ancient seawater concrete, berkeley lab, bessy synchrotron, chemical attack, cutting carbon emissions, drill core, emperor augustus, environmentally damaging, Germany, greenhouse gas emissions, gulf of naples, king abdullah university, library foundation, limestone, loeb classical, marie jackson, mediterranean sea, modern world, paulo monteiro, pliny the elder, pompeii, portland cement, pozzolan, pozzuoli bay, roman concrete, roman harbor, roman seawater concrete, samples, saudi arabia, secret, vitruvius, volcanic ash

Berkeley Lab scientists and their colleagues have discovered the properties that made ancient Roman concrete sustainable and durable

The chemical secrets of a concrete Roman breakwater that has spent the last 2,000 years submerged in the Mediterranean Sea have been uncovered by an international team of researchers led by Paulo Monteiro of the U.S. Department of Energy’s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab), a professor of civil and environmental engineering at the University of California, Berkeley.

Analysis of samples provided by team member Marie Jackson pinpointed why the best Roman concrete was superior to most modern concrete in durability, why its manufacture was less environmentally damaging – and how these improvements could be adopted in the modern world. (more…)

Recent Antarctic climate, glacier changes at the ‘upper bound’ of normal

By Guest PostMay 15, 2013Environmentantarctic glaciers, antarctic peninsula, antarctic warming, Antarctica, climate change, dark layer, eric steig, glaciers, global warming, human caused warming, ice core, ice sheet divide, icy continent, isotope oxygen 18, oxygen 16, qinghua ding, rapid ice loss, sea-level rise, south america, temperature, tropical pacific ocean, university of washington, upper bound, volcanic ash, west antarctic

In the last few decades, glaciers at the edge of the icy continent of Antarctica have been thinning, and research has shown the rate of thinning has accelerated and contributed significantly to sea level rise.

New ice core research suggests that, while the changes are dramatic, they cannot be attributed with confidence to human-caused global warming, said Eric Steig, a University of Washington professor of Earth and space sciences. (more…)

Ancient Mollusk Tells a Contrary Story

By Guest PostOctober 7, 2012Natureancient, aplacophora, border, cambrian period, computer software, david siveter, derek briggs, derek siveter, early, english welsh, evolutionary relationship, exterior shells, fossil, fossil evidence, great britain, imperial college, invertebrate group, julia sigwart, kulindroplax perissokomos, london, marine life, marine rock, mark sutton, molecular sequencing, mollusk, new fossil, peabody museum, sea bed, sea floor, shape, shell, shelled brethren, snail, three-dimensional, valve, volcanic ash, worm like, yale

A fossil unearthed in Great Britain may end a long-running debate about the mollusks, one of life’s most diverse invertebrate groups: Which evolved first, shelled forms like clams and snails, or their shell-less, worm-like relatives?

The small new fossil, found in marine rocks along the English-Welsh border, provides the best fossil evidence yet that the simpler worm-like mollusks evolved from their more anatomically complex shelled brethren, rather than the other way around. (more…)

Dwarf Species of Fanged Dinosaur Emerges from Southern Africa

By Guest PostOctober 4, 2012Nature, Scienceafrica, canines, carol abraczinskas, Chicago, China, different, dinosaur, dinosaur anatomy, dinosaur era, dwarf sized, dwarf species, fanged dinosaur, harvard university, herbivore, heterodontosaurs, lifestyle, new species, parrot shaped, paul sereno, pegomastax africanus, plant eating, porcupine, punk sized, radiation, rock, sereno, skull, south african, stegosaurus, supercontinent pangaea, thick jaw, tianyulong, todd marshall, toothed reptile, triceratops, tyler keillor, university, vampire, volcanic ash, zookeys

A new species of plant-eating dinosaur with tiny, 1-inch-long jaws has come to light in South African rocks dating to the early dinosaur era, some 200 million years ago.

This “punk-sized” herbivore is one of a menagerie of bizarre, tiny, fanged plant-eaters called heterodontosaurs, or “different toothed reptiles,” which were among the first dinosaurs to spread across the planet. (more…)

Geologists Correct a Rift in Africa

By Guest PostMarch 26, 2012Scienceafrica today, australia, climate change, earth crust, east africa, east african rift, eric roberts, ethiopia, geological sciences, giant arc, great rift valley, human evolution, human species, james cook university, Kenya, malawi, michael gottfried, michigan state university, model, nancy stevens, nature geoscience, ohio university, plate boundary, rukwa rift, system, tectonic forces, uganda, vertebrate fossils, volcanic ash

EAST LANSING, Mich. — The huge changes in the Earth’s crust that influenced human evolution are being redefined, according to research published today in Nature Geoscience.

The Great Rift Valley of East Africa – the birthplace of the human species – may have taken much longer to develop than previously believed.

“We now believe that the western portion of the rift formed about 25 million years ago, and is approximately as old as the eastern part, instead of much younger as other studies have maintained,” said Michael Gottfried, Michigan State University associate professor of geological sciences. “The significance is that the Rift Valley is the setting for the most crucial steps in primate and ultimately human evolution, and our study has major implications for the environmental and landscape changes that form the backdrop for that evolutionary story.” (more…)

Ceramic Coatings May Protect Jet Engines From Volcanic Ash

By Guest PostApril 17, 2011Scienceaircraft engines, ceramic coatings, jet engines, sand resistant coatings, silicate ash, thermal barrier coating, volcanic ash

COLUMBUS, Ohio – Last year’s $2 billion shutdown of European airspace following a volcanic eruption in Iceland alerted everyone to the danger that ash clouds can pose to aircraft engines. (more…)

Yellowstone’s Electrical Conductivity Hints Volcano Plume is Bigger Than Thought

By Guest PostApril 11, 2011Environmentcataclysmic caldera, central processing unit, cpu, ct scan, earthquake waves, electrical conductivity, geoelectric image, geophysicists, giant crater, hotspot, michael zhdanov, molten rock, plume, robert smith, salt lake city, seismic waves, volcanic ash, volcanically active area, yellowstone, yellowstone plume, yellowstone supervolcano, yellowstone volcano, yellowstone volcano observatory

WASHINGTON — Geophysicists have made the first large-scale picture of the electrical conductivity of the gigantic underground plume of hot and partly molten rock that feeds the Yellowstone supervolcano. The image suggests that the plume beneath the volcanically active area—renowned today for geysers and hot springs—is even bigger than it appears in earlier images made with earthquake waves.

“It’s like comparing ultrasound and MRI in the human body; they are different imaging technologies,” says geophysics Professor Michael Zhdanov of the University of Utah in Salt Lake City. Zhdanov is principal author of the new study and an expert on measuring magnetic and electrical fields on Earth’s surface to find oil, gas, minerals and geologic structures underground. (more…)

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