News tagged with geologic record

Climate played big role in Vikings' disappearance from Greenland

The end of the Norse settlements on Greenland likely will remain shrouded in mystery. While there is scant written evidence of the colony's demise in the 14th and early 15th centuries, archaeological remains ...

Other Sciences / Archaeology & Fossils

created May 30, 2011 | popularity 4.3 / 5 (7) | comments 4 | with audio podcast

Dinosaurs declined before mass extinction

Dinosaurs were dying out much earlier than the mass extinction event 65 million years ago, Natural History Museum scientists report in the Proceedings of the Royal Society journal today.

Other Sciences / Archaeology & Fossils

created Apr 30, 2009 | popularity 4.2 / 5 (15) | comments 5

Geologic Findings Undermine Theories of Permian Mass Extinction Timing

(PhysOrg.com) -- New scientific findings by geologist Robert Gastaldo of Colby College in Waterville, Maine, and colleagues call into question popular theories about the largest mass extinction in Earth's ...

Space & Earth / Earth Sciences

created Mar 02, 2009 | popularity 4.1 / 5 (20) | comments 3

Present ocean acidification rates are unprecedented: research

The world's oceans may be turning acidic faster today from human carbon emissions than they did during four major extinctions in the last 300 million years, when natural pulses of carbon sent global temperatures ...

Space & Earth / Environment

created Mar 01, 2012 | popularity 4.3 / 5 (25) | comments 43 | with audio podcast

Ice sheets can expand in a geologic instant, Arctic study shows

(PhysOrg.com) -- A fast-moving glacier on the Greenland Ice Sheet expanded in a geologic instant several millennia ago, growing in response to cooling periods that lasted not much longer than a century, according ...

Space & Earth / Earth Sciences

created Dec 14, 2011 | popularity 5 / 5 (4) | comments 9 | with audio podcast

Researchers pinpoint date and rate of Earth's most extreme extinction

It's well known that Earth's most severe mass extinction occurred about 250 million years ago. What's not well known is the specific time when the extinctions occurred. A team of researchers from North America ...

Space & Earth / Earth Sciences

created Nov 17, 2011 | popularity 5 / 5 (6) | comments 0 | with audio podcast

History's normal rate of species disappearance is accelerating, scientists say

Biologist E.O. Wilson once pondered whether many of our fellow living things were doomed once evolution gave rise to an intelligent, technological creature that also happened to be a rapacious carnivore, fiercely territorial ...

Biology / Plants & Animals

created Jul 31, 2011 | popularity 3.9 / 5 (16) | comments 11

Atmospheric carbon dioxide buildup unlikely to spark abrupt climate change

There have been instances in Earth history when average temperatures have changed rapidly, as much as 10 degrees Celsius (18 degrees Fahrenheit) over a few decades, and some have speculated the same could happen again as ...

Space & Earth / Earth Sciences

created Jun 20, 2011 | popularity 3.8 / 5 (13) | comments 27 | with audio podcast

Unexpected exoskeleton remnants found in Paleozoic fossils

Surprising new research shows that, contrary to conventional belief, remains of chitin-protein complex -- structural materials containing protein and polysaccharide -- are present in abundance in fossils of ...

Other Sciences / Archaeology & Fossils

created Feb 07, 2011 | popularity 5 / 5 (4) | comments 1 | with audio podcast

Putting the dead to work

Conservation paleobiologists -- scientists who use the fossil record to understand the evolutionary and ecological responses of present-day species to changes in their environment -- are putting the dead to ...

Biology / Evolution

created Jan 14, 2011 | popularity 4 / 5 (2) | comments 9 | with audio podcast

Species loss tied to ecosystem collapse and recovery

The world's oceans are under siege. Conservation biologists regularly note the precipitous decline of key species, such as cod, bluefin tuna, swordfish and sharks. Lose enough of these top-line predators (among ...

Space & Earth / Earth Sciences

created Jan 10, 2011 | popularity 5 / 5 (6) | comments 1 | with audio podcast

Rolling the dice with evolution: Massive extinction will have unpredictable consequences

(PhysOrg.com) -- New research by Macquarie University palaeobiologist, Dr John Alroy, predicts major changes to the rules of evolution as we understand them now. Those changes will have serious consequences for future biodiversity ...

Biology / Evolution

created Sep 03, 2010 | popularity 4.9 / 5 (14) | comments 74 | with audio podcast

Late-surviving megafauna exposed by ancient DNA in frozen soil

Extinct woolly mammoths and ancient American horses may have been grazing the North American steppe for several thousand years longer than previously thought. After plucking ancient DNA from frozen soil in ...

Biology / Biotechnology

created Dec 15, 2009 | popularity 4.5 / 5 (2) | comments 0

Nea Kameni volcano movement captured by Envisat (w/ Video)

(Phys.org) -- Archived data from the Envisat satellite show that the volcanic island of Santorini has recently displayed signs of unrest. Even after the end of its mission, Envisat information continues to ...

Space & Earth / Earth Sciences

created May 22, 2012 | popularity 5 / 5 (2) | comments 0

Study finds climate changes faster than species can adapt

The ranges of species will have to change dramatically as a result of climate change between now and 2100 because the climate will change more than 100 times faster than the rate at which species can adapt, ...

Biology / Ecology

created Dec 05, 2011 | popularity 5 / 5 (1) | comments 2