La Niña Strengthens

    The Pacific Northwest should brace for a colder and wetter than average winter, while most of the South and Southeast will be warmer and drier than average through February 2011, according to the annual Winter Outlook released Oct. 21, 2010 by NOAA's Climate Prediction Center.   A moderate to strong La Niña will be the dominant climate factor influencing weather across most of the U.S. this winter.  La Niña is associated with cooler than normal water temperatures in the Equatorial Pacific Ocean, unlike El Niño which is associated with warmer than normal water temperatures.  Both of these climate phenomena, which typically occur every 2-5 years, influence weather patterns throughout the world and often lead to extreme weather events.  Last winter's El Niño contributed to record-breaking rain and snowfall leading to severe flooding in some parts of the country, with record heat and drought in other parts of the country.  Although La Niña is the opposite of El Niño, it also has the potential to bring weather extremes to parts of the nation. (Science Daily)

Fire-Breathing Storm Systems

    A cumulonimbus without the "pyre" part is imposing enough - a massive, anvil-shaped tower of power reaching five miles (8 km) high, hurling thunderbolts, wind and rain.  Add smoke and fire to the mix and you have pyrocumulonimbus, an explosive storm cloud actually created by the smoke and heat from fire, and which can destroy tens of thousands of acres and in the process, "pyroCb" storms funnel their smoke like a chimney into Earth's stratosphere, with lingering ill effects.  Researchers believe these intense storms may be the source of what previously was believed to have been volcanic particles in the stratosphere.   They also suggest pyroCbs happen more often than thought, and say they're responsible for a huge volume of pollutants trapped in the upper atmosphere.  Three "mystery cloud phenomena" were cited as examples that were actually the result of pyrocumulonimbus storms, including one initially attributed to the 1991 eruption of Mount Pinatubo in the Philippines.  The plume thought to have been from Pinatubo was, it turns out, from a pyrocumulonimbus storm in Canada. (Science Daily)

The Greenhouse Effect

    The greenhouse effect is the rise in temperature that the Earth experiences because certain gases in the atmosphere (water vapor, carbon dioxide, nitrous oxide, and methane, for example) trap energy from the sun.  Without these gases, heat would escape back into space and Earth’s average temperature would be about 60ºF colder.  Because of how they warm our world, these gases are referred to as greenhouse gases.  The Earth’s atmosphere is all around us. It is the air that we breathe. Greenhouse gases in the atmosphere behave much like the glass panes in a greenhouse. Sunlight enters the Earth's atmosphere, passing through the blanket of greenhouse gases. As it reaches the Earth's surface, land, water, and biosphere absorb the sunlight’s energy. Once absorbed, this energy is sent back into the atmosphere.  Some of the energy passes back into space, but much of it remains trapped in the atmosphere by the greenhouse gases, causing our world to heat up.  The greenhouse effect is important. Without the greenhouse effect, the Earth would not be warm enough for humans to live.  But if the greenhouse effect becomes stronger, it could make the Earth warmer than usual.  Even a little extra warming may cause problems for humans, plants, and animals. (EPA)

New Species Found

  The findings by a team of marine biologists from Aberdeen, Tokyo and New Zealand, have found new life in the deepest places on Earth and the global distribution of fish in our oceans.  The expedition to the Peru/Chile trench in the South East Pacific Ocean revealed a new species of snailfish living at 7000m, never before caught or captured on camera.  Mass groupings of cusk eels and large crustacean scavengers were also discovered living at these depths for the first time.  During the three week expedition on the research vessel Sonne, the team of scientists employed deep-sea imaging technology, including an ultra-deep free-falling baited camera system, to take a total of 6000 images between 4500 and 8000 meters deep within the trench.  The expedition is the seventh to take place as part of HADEEP, a collaborative research project between the University of Aberdeen's Oceanlab and the University of Tokyo's Ocean Research Institute, with support from New Zealand's National Institute of Water and Atmospheric research institute (NIWA).  The HADEEP team has been investigating extreme depths across the globe for 3 years. Their findings to date have included capturing the world's deepest fish on camera for the first time. (Science Daily)

Land 'Evapotranspiration' Taking Unexpected Turn

    Most climate models have suggested that evapotranspiration, which is the movement of water from the land to the atmosphere, would increase with global warming.  The new research, published online this week in the journal Nature, found that's exactly what was happening from 1982 to the late 1990s.  But in 1998, this significant increase in evapotranspiration, which had been seven millimeters per year, slowed dramatically or stopped.  In large portions of the world, soils are now becoming drier than they used to be, releasing less water and off-setting some moisture increases elsewhere.  Due to the limited number of decades for which data are available, scientists say they can't be sure whether this is a natural variability or part of a longer lasting global change.  But one possibility is that on a global level, a limit to the acceleration of the hydrological cycle on land has already been reached.  If that's the case, the consequences could be serious.  They could include reduced terrestrial vegetation growth, less carbon absorption, a loss of the natural cooling mechanism provided by evapotranspiration, more heating of the land surface, more intense heat waves and a "feedback loop" that could intensify global warming.

Underwater Robot

    Scientists predict that the sea ice area around Antarctica will be reduced by more than 33 per cent by 2100, accelerating the collapse of ice shelves.  Up to hundreds of meters thick, ice shelves are floating platforms of ice that cover almost half of Antarctica's coastline.  The mission will study the effect of ice shelves on the mixing of sea water, and will provide critical data for the Antarctica 2010 Glacier Tongues and Ocean Mixing Research Project led by investigator Craig Stevens at the New Zealand National Institute for Water and Atmospheric Research.  The field site is located in New Zealand's Ross Dependency in Antarctica and the team includes scientists from New Zealand, Canada, the United States and France.  Until now, it was hard to try and even go in the icy waters to do any research but that will all change due to having the robots.  The Autonomous Underwater Vehicle (AUV), named UBC-Gavia, measures 2.5 meters long by half a meter wide and is equipped with temperature and salinity sensors, current meters, mapping sonar, a digital camera and water quality optical sensors. It will navigate the deep cold waters next to, and possibly under, the floating 100-metre thick Erebus Glacier Tongue in McMurdo Sound. (Science Daily)

Facts on the Amazon Rainforest

    The Amazon rainforest, world's largest remaining natural resource, represents 54% of the total rainforests left on Earth.  It covers an area of 2.5 million square miles, touching nine South America countries: Brazil, Colombia, Peru, Venezuela, Ecuador, Bolivia and the Guianas - Guyana, French Guiana and Suriname, or two thirds of the South America continent.  Its live force is the Amazon river, born in the Andean mountains of Peru, flows for more than 4,000 miles to end in the Atlantic ocean near Belem, Brazil.  Along the way, it is fed by about 1,100 tributaries.  More than 20% of Earth's oxygen is produced in this area, that is why it is named "Lungs of the Planet."  Amazon rainforest birds account for for at least one third of the world's bird species, being toucan the most popular icon.  An estimated 90% of Amazon rainforest plants used by Amazon natives have not been studied by modern science.  In 1500 there were an estimated 6 to 9 million Amazon natives.  By 1900 the number has gone down to one million left in Brazil.  Today, the number is believed to be of around 250,000 Amazon natives, totalling 215 ethnic groups with 170 different languages. (USTE)