Desertification. The word invokes images of sand dunes blowing over abandoned farms as some irresistible, dark force steadily transforms fertile fields into inhospitable wasteland. The United Nations’ ...

We are in the field supporting PACE-PAX (Plankton, Aerosol, Cloud, ocean Ecosystem Postlaunch Airborne eXperiment), a multi-disciplinary mission that involves two aircraft—the NASA ER-2 and CIRPAS ...

Mauna Loa is indeed an active volcano; it last erupted in 1950, 1975, and 1984. Between eruptions, it emits variable amounts of carbon dioxide (CO 2) and sulfur dioxide (SO 2) from fissures at the ...

Michael Carlowicz was managing editor of NASA’s Earth Observatory from 2010 to 2022. He has written about Earth science and geophysics since 1991 for several NASA divisions, the Woods Hole ...

Europeans imported the honeybee along with most of our food crops when they came to America more than 400 years ago. As generalist pollinators that can feed from almost any flowering plant, honeybees ...

Air temperatures on Earth have been rising since the Industrial Revolution. While natural variability plays some part, the preponderance of evidence indicates that human activities—particularly ...

When it comes to climate and climate change, the Earth's radiation budget is what makes it all happen. Swathed in its protective blanket of atmospheric gases against the boiling Sun and frigid space, ...

The cost and benefits of global warming will vary greatly from area to area. For moderate climate change, the balance can be difficult to assess. But the larger the change in climate, the more ...

Every month on Earth Matters, we offer a puzzling satellite image. The September 2024 puzzler is shown above. Your challenge is to use the comments section to tell us where it is, what we are looking ...

Because phytoplankton are so crucial to ocean biology and climate, any change in their productivity could have a significant influence on biodiversity, fisheries and the human food supply, and the ...

Three hundred forty watts per square meter of incoming solar power is a global average; solar illumination varies in space and time. The annual amount of incoming solar energy varies considerably from ...

Welcome, teachers, to Mission: Biomes! This site was designed for teachers to use in classrooms as a supplementary, interdisciplinary unit. Mission: Biomes is especially appropriate for grades 3 ...