All Stories by Sid Perkins
- Earth
Humming Along: Ocean waves may cause global seismic noise
The slow and nearly constant vibrations of Earth's crust stem from severe winter weather over some of the world's oceans.
- Paleontology
Big Gulp? Neck ribs may have given aquatic beast unique feeding style
The fossilized neck bones of a 230-million-year-old sea creature have features suggesting that the animal's snakelike throat could flare open and create suction to pull in prey.
- Earth
Cool Harvest: Frost on sea ice may boost atmosphere’s bromine
Frost flowers, the delicate crystals that sometimes grow atop fresh sea ice, can be a substantial source of ozone-destroying bromine in lower atmosphere near the poles.
- Earth
Paved Paradise?
The precipitation-fed runoff that spills from impervious surfaces such as buildings, roads, and parking lots in developed areas increases erosion in streams, wreaks ecological havoc there, and contributes to urban heat islands.
- Earth
North and South: Equal melting from each hemisphere raised ice age sea levels
The gargantuan volumes of meltwater that boosted sea levels during the most recent round of ice ages derived equally from ice sheets in the Northern and Southern Hemispheres.
- Planetary Science
Martian ice could be sculpting surface patterns
Images taken by the Mars Global Surveyor suggest that most areas with geological features known as patterned ground appear at high latitudes.
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Some corals like it hotter
The heat-tolerant algae that live symbiotically within some corals may enable their hosts to adapt to the warmer water temperatures projected to accompany long-term climate change.
- Tech
A new deep-sea submersible
Scientists have announced a 4-year, $21.6-million design-and-construction effort to replace the aging research submersible Alvin.
- Earth
Early Shift: North Sea plankton and fish move out of sync
As ocean temperatures in the North Sea have warmed in recent decades, the life cycles of some species low in the food chain have accelerated significantly, sometimes wreaking ecological havoc.
- Paleontology
Growth Spurt: Teenage tyrannosaurs packed on the pounds
Detailed analyses of tyrannosaur fossils suggest that the creatures experienced an extended growth spurt during adolescence.
- Paleontology
Fossil find extends ants’ ancient lineage
The recently described, 92-million-year-old fossil of a primitive worker ant pushes back the first record of its particular subfamily by 40 million years, forcing researchers to reevaluate their ideas about the early evolution of these insects.
- Planetary Science
Meteorites quickly reach Earth
Fragments from collisions between large bodies in the asteroid belt can reach Earth in as little as 100,000 years.
