Our Earth is currently working its way toward being the exact opposite of a snowball Earth as we see glaciers and ice caps receding across the planet. This is fundamentally changing our landscape and how we as humans interact with that landscape. These changes are most evident in the northern, Arctic landscapes of Alaska, Scandinavia, and Siberia where indigenous people’s have lived in close contact with the land, and rely on permafrost for refrigeration and frozen waterways for transit. As permafrost melts weird stuff is happening. From amazing frozen animals being revealed, to...
Between fire and ice is slush
Snowball Earth. Credit: NASA Our planet has been driven to environmental extremes at many times in its history, and many plants and animals - including humans - have demonstrated they can survive less than ideal conditions. The last major ice age hit its peak 20 to 26...
Volcanoes: Sometimes they cool & sometimes they heat
An international team of geoscientists journeyed to northeastern Oregon, where massive volcanism has been linked with climate warming 16 million years ago. For their study, the scientists zeroed in the Wallowa Mountains, which are laced with enormous sheets of flat...
Dinosaurs thrived after Ice
Archaeopteryx Credit: Peter Montgomery Jupiter’s moon Io is the most volcanic object in our solar system today, but our planet gave Io a run for its money more than 200 million years ago. At that point in our planet's history, our world was dominated by the Triassic...
Ep. 3.04 Planning for Asteroid Attacks, Dino Prints Cross Ocean, Viper Updates, & more
This is another weird week for space news, where it felt like human space exploration was going to steal every headline. We saw the successful return to Earth of Boeing’s Starliner capsule, the successful launch of Polaris Dawn and what appears, at the time of this...
Dino Prints Match Continents
One of the reasons we study the Moon is to help us understand the history of our own planet Earth. The shifting continents and weather patterns of Earth join forces to erase our world’s history. Occasionally, however, our planet reveals its past through the rocks...
Chang’e 5 Returns Some Really Cool Science
Change'e 5 landing site overview. Credit: Chinese National Space Agency's (CNSA) Lunar Exploration and Space Engineering Center On Dec 1, 2020, China landed the Chang’e 5 mission on the near side of the moon. Three days later, that little lander lifted back off with...
Stonehenge Stones More Geographically Diverse Than Originally Thought
Image credit: Stefan Kühn Before we go, I have a new mystery for you. Researchers, with permission, took a small sample from the altar stone at Stonehenge and examined its composition and structure in a new level of detail. This information made it possible to...
Ep. 3.03 Mars is the future, the day the Dinos Died, a Star’s Death in 3 Acts, and more
I have to admit, realizing it is somehow late August was a bit startling. I’m not entirely sure where my summer went, but I am grateful that my garden is finally producing veg, and the temps are starting to slowly trend downward. The Dog Days of summer are named for...
Dino-Killer Asteroid Came From the Outer Solar System
A shaded relief image of Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula. NASA/JPL-Caltech. The single messiest day in geologically recorded history was the day the dinosaurs died. On that day, and across the days that would follow, tidal waves wrapped multiple times around our world as...
Closer Look: The cost of the climate of academia
We are recording this episode about a week in advance of our normal recording date. This is because our producer Ally Pelphrey and I will be at the Balticon science fiction and fantasy convention over Memorial Day weekend and I’m then flying to Orlando where I’ll be...