News Releases
WHOI to Host Public Forum on Climate Change and Global Water Supplies
Severe droughts, floods, and storms are now a routine part of our nation’s weather forecast. Remarkably hot and dry weather in 2011 caused droughts in Texas, the Plains states and…
Read MoreLong-Term Carbon Storage in Ganges Basin May Portend Global Warming Worsening
Global warming could destabilize the pool of carbon in the Ganges-Brahmaputra basin and similar places on Earth, potentially increasing the rate of CO2 release into the atmosphere.
Read MoreNovel Ocean-Crust Mechanism Could Affect World’s Carbon Budget
The Earth is constantly manufacturing new crust, spewing molten magma up along undersea ridges at the boundaries of tectonic plates. The process is critical to the planet?s metabolism, including the cycle of underwater life and the delicate balance of carbon in the ocean and atmosphere. Now, scientists at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) have observed ocean crust forming in an entirely unexpected way?one that may influence those cycles of life and carbon and, in turn, affect the much-discussed future of the world?s climate.
Read MoreCO2 Emissions Continue Significant Climb
The annual rate of increase in carbon dioxide emissions from fossil fuels has more than tripled in this decade, compared to the 1990s, reports an international consortium of scientists, who paint a bleak picture of the Earth?s future unless ?CO2 emissions [are] drastically reduced.?
Read MoreCarbon Acts Like Rustoleum Around Hydrothermal Vents
The cycling of iron throughout the oceans has been an area of intense research for the last two decades. Oceanographers have spent a lot of time studying what has been…
Read MoreOcean Islands Fuel Productivity and Carbon Sequestration Through Natural Iron Fertilization
An experiment to study the effects of naturally deposited iron in the Southern Ocean has filled in a key piece of the puzzle surrounding iron’s role in locking atmospheric carbon…
Read MoreOcean’s “Twilight Zone” Plays Important Role in Climate Change
A major study has shed new light on the dim layer of the ocean called the “twilight zone”where mysterious processes affect the ocean’s ability to absorb and store carbon dioxide…
Read MoreSeafloor bacteria are multi-tasking with the carbon cycle
Scientists have long known that microorganisms can use one of two different methods to convert carbon dioxide into a form that living things can use for energy. What they didn’t…
Read MoreJellyfish-Like Creatures May Play Major Role in Fate of Carbon Dioxide in the Ocean
Transparent jellyfish-like creatures known as salps, considered by many a low member in the ocean food web, may be more important to the fate of the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide…
Read MoreVERTIGO: Carbon Cycling in the Twilight Zone
Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) scientists and their international colleagues will be at sea off Hawaii in June trying to learn more about the ocean’s ability to store atmospheric carbon…
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