Frontpage » Tag » alaska

News tagged with alaska

Beyond oil, can Alaska be tapped as a source for renewable energy?

Alaska has massive hydro, wind, geothermal and other renewable resources, but the state's rural villages are chained to diesel and suffer oppressive energy costs they say threaten their existence. Lawmakers, energy experts ...

Technology / Energy & Green Tech

created May 25, 2012 | popularity not rated yet | comments 1

Alaskan ecologists see surge in Japan tsunami debris

An "unprecedented" surge in debris from last year's Japanese tsunami is washing up on Alaska's coastline, environmentalists about to embark on a major cleanup operation said.

Space & Earth / Earth Sciences

created May 23, 2012 | popularity not rated yet | comments 0

Research shows part of Alaska inundated by ancient megafloods

(PhysOrg.com) -- New research indicates that one of the largest fresh-water floods in Earth's history happened about 17,000 years ago and inundated a large area of Alaska that is now occupied in part by the ...

Space & Earth / Earth Sciences

created Apr 28, 2010 | popularity 4.7 / 5 (10) | comments 5 | with audio podcast

Study reveals for first time true diversity of life in soils across the globe, new species discovered

(PhysOrg.com) -- Microscopic animals that live in soils are as diverse in the tropical forests of Costa Rica as they are in the arid grasslands of Kenya or the tundra and boreal forests of Alaska and Sweden, ...

Biology / Ecology

created Oct 18, 2011 | popularity 5 / 5 (7) | comments 2 | with audio podcast

Scientists isolate new antifreeze molecule in Alaska beetle

Scientists have identified a novel antifreeze molecule in a freeze-tolerant Alaska beetle able to survive temperatures below minus 100 degrees Fahrenheit. Unlike all previously described biological antifreezes that contain ...

Chemistry / Biochemistry

created Dec 14, 2009 | popularity 5 / 5 (15) | comments 4

US opens ways for Shell Arctic Ocean drilling

US officials have granted oil giant Shell conditional approval to begin drilling exploration wells in the Arctic Ocean from next year, a move swiftly slammed by conservationists as "inexcusable".

Space & Earth / Environment

created Aug 05, 2011 | popularity 3 / 5 (14) | comments 10

Can evolution outpace climate change?

(PhysOrg.com) -- Animals and plants may not be able to evolve their way out of the threat posed by climate change, according to a UC Davis study of a tiny seashore animal. The work was published today (June ...

Biology / Ecology

created Jun 08, 2011 | popularity 4 / 5 (9) | comments 69 | with audio podcast

Lessons learned from the two worst oils spills in U.S. history

One year after the notorious BP Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico and two decades after the Exxon Valdez spill in Prince William Sound off the coast of Alaska the scientific lesson is clear ...

Space & Earth / Environment

created Aug 19, 2011 | popularity 3 / 5 (2) | comments 3 | with audio podcast

Satellite images show eruption on Alaska volcano

(AP) -- A volcano on a remote Alaska island has begun erupting, but poses little danger to people or aircraft, officials said Tuesday.

Space & Earth / Earth Sciences

created Aug 10, 2011 | popularity 5 / 5 (1) | comments 0

Researcher shows fishing has reduced salmon size in Alaska

(PhysOrg.com) -- Neala Kendall, a graduate student from the University of Washington in Seattle, after studying cannery data on sockeye salmon harvested from Bristol Bay in Alaska, has discovered that the ...

Biology / Ecology

created Jun 08, 2011 | popularity 5 / 5 (2) | comments 5 | with audio podcast report

Assessing the influence of Alaska glaciers is slippery work

With an estimated 34,000 square miles of ice, an area about the size of Maine, Alaska's multitude of glaciers have a global impact.

Space & Earth / Earth Sciences

created May 27, 2011 | popularity 5 / 5 (1) | comments 0 | with audio podcast

Lover's lane for birds found in Arctic

A new study by the Wildlife Conservation Society reveals the critical importance of western Arctic Alaska's Teshekpuk Lake region to tens of thousands of birds that breed in the area during the brief, but ...

Space & Earth / Environment

created Mar 10, 2011 | popularity not rated yet | comments 0 | with audio podcast

Frequent, severe fires turn Alaskan forests into a carbon production line

(PhysOrg.com) -- Alaskan forests used to be important players in Mother Nature’s game plan for regulating carbon dioxide levels in the air. It’s elementary earth science: Trees take up carbon dioxide ...

Space & Earth / Earth Sciences

created Feb 10, 2011 | popularity 4.6 / 5 (7) | comments 2 | with audio podcast

New data: Mega-quake could strike near Seattle

Using sophisticated seismometers and GPS devices, scientists have been able to track minute movements along two massive tectonic plates colliding 25 miles or so underneath Washington state's Puget Sound basin. Their early ...

Space & Earth / Earth Sciences

created Aug 16, 2009 | popularity 4.9 / 5 (14) | comments 2

Satellite imagery shows Typhoon Vamco has a huge 45-mile wide eye

Typhoon Vamco is being as stubborn in its quest to live in the Pacific Ocean as Bill is in the Atlantic Ocean this week, and NASA satellite data confirmed that the large storm has a huge eye, about 45 miles ...

Space & Earth / Earth Sciences

created Aug 24, 2009 | popularity 3.7 / 5 (3) | comments 0

Alaska

Alaska ( /əˈlæskə/ (help·info)) is the largest state of the United States of America by area; it is situated in the northwest extremity of the North American continent, with Canada to the east, the Arctic Ocean to the north, and the Pacific Ocean to the west and south, with Russia further west across the Bering Strait. Approximately half of Alaska's 683,478 residents reside within the Anchorage metropolitan area. As of 2007, Alaska remains the least densely populated state of the U.S.

The U.S. Senate approved the purchase of Alaska from the Russian Empire on March 30, 1867, for $7.2 million at two cents per acre, about five cents per hectare. The land went through several administrative changes before becoming an organized territory on May 11, 1912 and the 49th state of the U.S. on January 3, 1959. The name "Alaska" was already introduced in the Russian colonial time, when it was used only for the peninsula and is derived from the Aleut alaxsxaq, meaning "the mainland" or more literally, "the object towards which the action of the sea is directed." It is also known as Alyeska, the "great land," an Aleut word derived from the same root.

For more information about Alaska, read the full article at Wikipedia.
This text uses material from Wikipedia and is available under the GNU Free Documentation License.