Earth

  1. A photo of a conifer forest with mountains in the background and a bright blue sky.
    Environment

    Surviving a drought may help forests weather future dry spells

    Climate change is making droughts more intense and frequent, but conifer forests have a trick up their sleeve, airplane and satellite data show.

    By Katherine Kornei
  2. A close up photo of a screwworm on a red background.
    Life

    50 years ago, flesh-eating screwworms pushed scientists to mass produce flies

    "Fly factories” dreamed up in the early 1970s have helped North and Central America keep screwworms in check for decades.

    By Nikk Ogasa
  3. An illustration of the Parker Solar Probe heading towards the sun with orange light streaks shooting around it.
    Astronomy

    The Parker Solar Probe may have spotted the origin of high-speed solar winds

    Kinks in the magnetic fields near the surface of the sun appear to be the cause of fast-moving flows in the solar wind.

    By James R. Riordon
  4. A satellite image of Hurricane Ian with its eye just west of Florida
    Climate

    Why the 2023 Atlantic hurricane season is especially hard to predict

    It’s hard to know how busy this year’s Atlantic hurricane season will be, thanks to a rarely observed combination of ocean and climate conditions.

    By Carolyn Gramling
  5. A house in Indonesia
    Environment

    This house was built partly from recycled diapers

    Disposable diapers can replace nearly a third of the materials used in load-bearing structures, offering a potential path to more affordable housing.

    By Carolyn Gramling
  6. A photo of a wooded area with green plants in the foreground and a fallen tree in the middle ground.
    Plants

    Soil microbes that survived tough climates can help young trees do the same

    Trees grown in soil with microbes that have survived drought and high or low temperatures have a better shot at survival when facing the same conditions.

    By Erin Garcia de Jesús
  7. A photo of a clear glass container with a white sea cucumber floating in a clear liquid. Other clear glass containers are sitting on the table behind the sea cucumber with out of focus books on shelves in the background.
    Life

    5,000 deep-sea animals new to science turned up in ocean records

    Scientists compiled a list of animals unknown to science that live in a deep-sea Pacific Ocean ecosystem targeted for mining exploration.

    By Jude Coleman
  8. A photo from high up of Lake Urmia in Iran.
    Environment

    More than half of the world’s largest lakes are drying up

    Satellite data from 1992 to 2020 reveal that 53 percent of the world’s largest freshwater bodies shrank during that period while only 24 percent grew.

    By Nikk Ogasa
  9. A photo of a man at an electric vehicle charging station with a black car parked next to him.
    Climate

    There’s good and bad news with California’s electric vehicle program

    The electric vehicle program is reducing carbon dioxide emissions but also shifting the pollution burden to the state’s most disadvantaged communities.

    By Carolyn Gramling
  10. A photo looking into a drill hole in West Antarctica. White ice is seen on the edges of the frame which turns into a gradient of light blue to dark blue in the center circle of the image.
    Life

    In one lake deep under Antarctica’s ice, microbes feast on ancient carbon

    Microorganisms living in a lake beneath the ice sheet in West Antarctica feed on ocean carbon that was deposited 6,000 years ago.

    By Freda Kreier
  11. A lightning bolt piercing smoke and lava from a volcanic eruption
    Life

    Ancient giant eruptions may have seeded nitrogen needed for life

    A new study bolsters the idea that on the young Earth volcanic lightning may have provided some materials that made it possible for life to emerge.

    By Bas den Hond
  12. An elevation image of Kelvin Seamount, in a rainbow of color with purple at the bottom and red at the top, on a black background.
    Oceans

    Satellite data reveal nearly 20,000 previously unknown deep-sea mountains

    By looking for tiny bumps in sea level caused by the gravity of subsurface mountains, researchers have roughly doubled the number of known seamounts.

    By Katherine Kornei