Wednesday, 22 May, 2013

As molten rock gathers underground, a huge volcanic field in Chile is the fastest-rising land on Earth. The biggest eruptions at Laguna del Maule, if they happened today, would change our climate and planet. Scientists are racing to understand a strange unrest in a bizarre landscape.

How do hurricanes form? How do we predict their paths? How can we improve predictions?

We love accurate weather forecasts, but the weather satellites they rely on are nearing the boneyard. Some replacements have crashed into the ocean, others are in financial limbo. Be very worried about our fragile planet: these satellites also track climate, ice, fire, and the health of forests and ocean!

New instruments are giving a better view of how those astonishingly strong lightning bolts form inside clouds – and we are also getting a better picture of the many ways that lightning can harm us.

Are extreme heat, wicked cyclones and record rainfalls signs of climate change, or just more changes in the weather? Will warming eliminate record cold days? Will hurricanes get bigger?

Aftershocks and triggered earthquakes both follow a large earthquake, and they don’t happen at random. Can lessons about the sequence and timing of quakes improve safety?

Oils in spent coffee grounds are easily converted into biodiesel — a renewable source of transportation energy. Bottoms up for CofFuel?

Construction matters. Hundreds of millions live and work in houses and schools that will collapse in the next earthquake. Chile and California prove that smart engineering saves lives.

How do hurricanes form? How do we predict their paths? How can we improve predictions?

Some call it Fall. Some call it spring. But nobody in the Midwest, East Coast or Northern Europe is calling it “winter.” What’s up with our weather?

Could something as simple, cheap and natural as a forest protect a coastline from a tsunami’s titanic wave? It’s looking that way…

As New Orleans sinks and the seas rise, hurricanes are getting worse. Does it make sense to start restoring marshes and barrier islands that dampen the hurricanes? Could wetlands moderate the next Katrina?

Is global warming feeding hurricanes? Global warming has already raised sea levels. Is warming also making hurricanes like Katrina more intense? Some new evidence says yes.

Monkeypox, AIDS, SARS: Are more diseases jumping from animals to people, or is it just our imagination?

Throw a curve ball. Evade the rainstorm. And don’t get mouth cancer. It’s all in an afternoon’s ball game.