Coastal bluffs at Drew Point, on Alaska’s coastal plain, can erode 20 meters per year. As soil melts, storm waves may bite abrupt and unpredictable chunks out of the coastline.
Credit: U.S. Geological Survey.
Featured Research
Coldwater corals thrive near methane cold seeps
Most corals live in sunny, oxygen-rich waters off tropical coasts. But in the dark, cold, low-oxygen depths of Norway’s Hola trough, corals coexist with methane cold seeps bubbling up from gas hydrates frozen in the ocean floor. A new study suggests a “delicate equilibrium” of diverse microbial life, dissolved organic carbon and biochemical mechanisms associated with the seeps in the low oxygen depths benefit the corals. Further warming could release a burst of methane, upsetting that balance. [Journal of Geophysical Research: Biogeosciences study]
Storms will eat Alaska’s Arctic coastal tundra in increasingly unpredictable bites
New research from Point Hope, Alaska, finds large land losses are inevitable on the Arctic coastal plain along Alaska’s north coast. Predictable yearly coastal retreat will shift to sudden losses from extreme storms as thawing soil makes coastlines more vulnerable to waves and rising seas. Remote coastal Inupiat communities may need to step up timelines for adaptation or relocation. [Journal of Geophysical Research: Earth Surface study]
Sailors’ historical accounts key to rare, glowing “milky seas”
Satellites have caught the mysterious milky waters lighting more than 100,000 square kilometers of open ocean, but the phenomenon is so rare that only a single scientific expedition has encountered it, leaving scientists in the dark about when, where and why it happens — and if the leading bacterial suspect, Vibrio harveyi, is the true source of the eerie glow. A new global database assembles 400 years of eyewitness accounts with the aim of predicting future bioluminescent blooms.[Earth and Space Science study][CSU press release]
“Thirstwaves” are the new climate threat for US crops
Like heat waves, these can damage crops and ecosystems and increase pressure on water resources. New research shows they’re becoming more severe. [Eos research spotlight][Earth’s Future study]
Restoring preindustrial CO2 levels won’t bring back all Arctic sea ice. This may make North Atlantic winter weather weird.
Incomplete Arctic sea ice recovery results in equatorward-shifted winter jets. The North Atlantic jet shift is particularly uncertain due to the ocean circulation acting as an additional driver. [Eos Editors’ highlight][Geophysical Research Letters study]
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