Climate243
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Studying the Farthest-North Trees
A team led by Kevin Anchukaitis of the Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory Tree Ring Lab is currently in Alaska’s Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, studying the effects of changing climate on trees. Working near the treeline, they’re taking cores from spindly white spruces to measure weather of the past.
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Ancient mud from the high Andes
Thanks in large part to Matt, an undergraduate from Pacific Lutheran University in Washington, our field team now has more than sixty samples for surface-exposure dating. This is no easy feat, for collecting these samples requires a great deal of hammering on granite boulders with nothing more than a hammer and chisel. There are other…
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Climate information and disasters: two interviews
Jan Egeland and Madeleen Helmer talk about the value of forecasts in disaster preparation.
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A typical day in the high Andes
Each morning starts the same in the Andes: the frost is heavy on the insides of our tents and falls with the slightest movement, while the realization that it´s going to be a freezing exit from the sleeping bag is tempered by gratitude that the thirteen hour night is over. Yes, sunrise in the Andes…
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Climate News Roundup: Week of 6/26
Prodigal Plankton Returns to the Atlantic, Discovery News, Jun 26 According to researchers with the Sir Alister Hardy Foundation for Ocean Science, a species of plankton called Neodenticula seminae is an Atlantic resident again, 800,000 years after it became extinct in the ocean. The microscopic plant has been documented with sufficient frequency over the last…
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Climate Forecasting: Oceans, Droughts, Climate Change and Other Tools of the Trade
At the International Research Institute for Climate and Society’s monthly climate briefing, talk often focuses on the role that El Niño or La Niña play in driving global climate. With the collapse of La Niña last month, though, IRI’s forecasters now have to rely on different tools to offer forecasts for the coming year. That’s…
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Yes, We Can Afford to Remove Carbon from Air
Recently, the American Physical Society (APS) released a report on the direct capture of carbon dioxide from air. The report concludes that air capture could be a powerful tool for mopping up carbon dioxide emissions that otherwise would escape to the air, for providing carbon dioxide for synthetic liquid fuels in the transportation sector, and…
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Understanding the Mind as the Temperature Climbs
Warnings of potentially cataclysmic climate change have reached nearly every newspaper front page and legislative chamber around the globe since the 1990s. So why has the human response been so limited?
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Foreigners in a Strange Land
After a very cold morning in Crucero, the sun burned off the clouds to reveal the black peaks of the Cordillera Carabaya to the east. There´s not so much snow left on the hills these days, just a few glacier patches clinging to the south faces of the highest summits.
AGU25, the premier Earth and space science conference, takes place December 15-19, 2025 in New Orleans, Louisiana. This year’s theme—Where Science Connects Us—puts in focus how science depends on connection, from the lab to the field to the ballot box. Once again, Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory and Columbia Climate School scientists, experts, students, and educators are playing an active role, sharing our research and helping shape the future of our planet. #AGU25 Learn More
