Climate

One of the best ways to analyze Earth's past climate is with samples drilled from deep ice cores. Now, scientists have dated what may be the world’s oldest ice core, with some sections potentially preserving samples as old as 5 million years.

Climate scientists have reported the highest levels of carbon dioxide ever recorded in the atmosphere. The latest in a series of record-breaking years saw levels 50 percent higher than pre-industrial times, a concentration not seen 4 million years.

Though the lockdowns brought on by the coronavirus pandemic led to some extreme dips in global carbon emissions, new analysis form the International Energy Agency (IEA) has shown how insignificant they may be in the grand scheme of things.

The ozone layer is often seen as a success story for human action to correct a climate emergency – but unfortunately we may be undoing our own hard work. A new study suggests smoke from wildfires can deplete the ozone layer, delaying its recovery.

Last year the UN's top climate scientists released the first in a trio of reports detailing the dangers of unabated global warming. The second report is now in, and the outlook is only becoming darker.

Members of a student team from the Technology University of Eindhoven are about to embark on a fact-finding mission to the South Pole that will inform the creation of an autonomous solar-powered Antarctica research rover.

A new type of storm has been discovered in the skies over the Indian Ocean. Named “atmospheric lakes,” these events are slow-moving pools of concentrated water vapor that can last for days and bring large amounts of rain to the surface below them.

After sending a fleet of self-sailing drones into the path of Hurricane Sam to help improve forecast models, Saildrone has now launched three uncrewed surface vehicles into the Gulf Stream winter to gather data on carbon uptake in the ocean.

Nitrous oxide is a potent greenhouse gas – and now it looks like we may have underestimated how much is being released. A new study has identified the thawing Siberian permafrost as a huge, previously unknown source of nitrous oxide emissions.

A research team has begun an €11-million (US$12.9-million) project with the hopes of collecting the oldest continuous ice core in Antarctica, providing a record of the climate spanning some 1.5 million years.

A new study has revealed yet another way that human-induced climate change is affecting the planet. Decades of weather balloon and satellite data has shown that the Earth’s troposphere is expanding, even after natural variations are accounted for.

The 2021 Nobel Prize in Physics has been awarded to three scientists for "groundbreaking contributions to our understanding of complex physical systems." One half went jointly to Syukuro Manabe and Klaus Hasselmann, and the other to Giorgio Parisi.