A new artificial neural network named CALFIN catalogues the rates at which glaciers are melting, demonstrating what the future of glaciology could look like.

As glaciers recede in the Italian Alps, a shift toward grasslands is threatening native herbs like Artemisia genipi, a key ingredient in the region’s traditional liqueurs.

Latrines created by vicuñas, wild relatives of llamas, provide vital nutrients for plants on post-glaciated mountain landscapes in the Andes.

That change would have affected the monsoons, today relied on to feed over half the world’s population, and could have helped tip the climate system over the threshold for deglaciation.

The most important lessons drawn from geology are that the earth’s climate can change radically, and rapidly. We can’t say precisely at what CO2 level we’re in danger of melting Antarctica, but that threshold could be reached in 150-300 years, if CO2 levels keep rising at the current rate.