Research News

Stalled Economy or Not, Record Year for CO2 Emissions

Each person on the planet produced 1.3 tons of carbon last year—an all-time high--despite a global recession that slowed the growth of fossil fuel emissions for the first time this decade, according to a report published this week in the journal Nature Geoscience. Emissions grew 2 percent last year, to total 8.7 billion tons of carbon dioxide.

Glaciers Have Moved Together in Far-Flung Regions

A new study adds evidence that climate swings in Europe and North America during the last ice age were closely linked to changes in the tropics. The study, published this week in the journal Science, suggests that a prolonged cold spell...

Sea Change

The world’s oceans are growing more acidic as carbon emissions from the modern world are absorbed by the sea. A new film, “A Sea Change,” explores what this changing chemistry means for fish and the one billion people who rely on them for food. This first-ever documentary about ocean acidification is told through the eyes of a retired history teacher who reads about the problem in a piece in The New Yorker and is inspired to find out more. His quest takes him to Alaska, California, Washington and Norway to talk with oceanographers, climatologists and others.

Calculating the Damage in China

Art Lerner-Lam on MSNBC speaking about the earthquake damage in China and why aftershocks will continue to rock China for months.

Three Scientists Elected to Top Academies

Three scientists at Columbia’s Earth Institute have been elected to leading U.S. scientific academies.

Paul E. Olsen, a paleontologist and climate researcher at Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory, was elected to the National Academy of Sciences. Lamont seismologist Paul G. Richards was elected to the American Academy of Arts & Sciences, along with agronomist Pedro Sanchez, who heads the Earth Institute’s Tropical Agriculture Program.

Southern Flavor in the Arctic

May 1, 2008 -- Rocks under the northern ocean are found to resemble ones far south

Scientists probing volcanic rocks from deep under the frozen surface of the Arctic Ocean have discovered a special geochemical signature until now found only in the southern hemisphere.

New Seafloor Cores Show Tight Bond Between Dust and Past Climates

Feb. 28, 2008 ---Each year, long-distance winds drop up to 900 million tons of dust from deserts and other parts of the land into the oceans. Scientists suspect this phenomenon connects to global climate—but exactly how, remains a question.  Now a big piece of the puzzle has fallen into place...

Lamont Scientists Featured on NBC Nightly News Story

January 14, 2008 - Lamont Scientists Douglas Martinson and Robin Bell were featured in an NBC Nightly News story entitled "Meltdown in Antartica."

The story is part of Nightly News' ongoing "Our Planet" series that examines issues effecting the earth's environment.

Earth Science Made Easier

Instead of an ice-covered South Pole, picture sub-tropical temperatures and flowering plants. That’s what parts of Antarctica looked like 85 million years ago. How long ago was that? If you’re drawing a blank you’re not alone.

Thinking on geologic time scales does not come easily for many people, and that’s a challenge in teaching earth science, says Lamont-Doherty oceanographer Kim Kastens, in a recent cover story in EOS, a weekly newspaper published by the American Geophysical Union.

Wallace Broecker Speaks to BBC's "The World"

Wallace Broecker Speaks to BBC's "The World", broadcast on July 7th & July 9th 2009 as part of a three part series on energy and climate.

As politicians and environmentalists prepare for the UN Climate Change talks in December to discuss urgent reduction of CO2 emissions, the BBC asked what is the future for global energy production?

Five Decades of Studying CO2 at Sea : Takahashi Honored for Pioneering Measurements

The oceans play a central role in cycling carbon dioxide into and out of the atmosphere, and thus an  essential role in regulating climate. Taro Takahashi, a geochemist at Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory, has spent the last five decades measuring this process, and the April issue of the journal Deep Sea Research II is dedicated to him for this pioneering work.

CO2 Higher Today Than Last 2.1 Million Years

Researchers have reconstructed atmospheric carbon dioxide levels over the past 2.1 million years in the sharpest detail yet, shedding new light on its role in the earth’s cycles of cooling and warming.

Wallace Broecker Featured on WNJN

Lamont Scientist Wallace Broecker was featured in a two part series on WNJN, New Jersey Public Television.

Latest Korean Blast Outdid 2006 Nuke Test

Seismologists, Pinpointing Location, See Little Doubt It Was Bomb  

Seismologists who have intensively studied North Korea’s nuclear testing efforts say Monday’s blast was certainly a nuclear bomb, roughly five times larger than the country’s first test in 2006.

New Geochemistry Center Wins Awards

The new Gary C. Comer Geochemistry Building at Columbia University's Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory in Palisades, N.Y., has won three top architecture awards. Recognized for its environment-friendly features, the building houses more than 80 staff, many of whom have long been at the forefront of global climate research. Scientists in Lamont's geochemistry division study the movements and interactions of substances in air, oceans, groundwater, biological remains, sediments and rocks.

Mudslides: Forecasting Risk

Landslides kill thousands of people each year but because they're often triggered by earthquakes or heavy rains, the danger remains poorly understood. A PhD candidate at Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory has put together a global catalog of recent mudslides to help scientists better predict where and when the next one will occur.

New book, Climate Change: the Science of Global Warming and Our Energy Future

A new book, Climate Change: the Science of Global Warming and Our Energy Future, serves as an excellent, long-needed primer on the workings of earth's climate.

Teaching Earth Science: Oceanographer Wins Prestigious Prize

Oceanographer Wins Prestigious Prize for Work Advancing Education

Kim Kastens, an oceanographer at Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory, has been recognized for her research in making spatial concepts in earth science easier for students in a wide age range to understand. She will receive the American Geophysical Union’s Excellence in Geophysical Education Award at a ceremony in Toronto in May.

Climate Change Work by Lamont-Doherty Researchers Recognized

Four current and former researchers at Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory will receive honorary degrees from their alma mater, St. Lawrence University, this spring. The degrees will be awarded at May graduation to paleoclimatologist Peter deMenocal; engineer Dale Chayes; paleoceanographer Miriam Katz; and oceanographer Richard Fairbanks.

What Was That Big Bang?

Iran seems to be moving toward an atomic bomb; North Korea reportedly could build a half dozen; and terrorist attacks have revived the specter of a faceoff between nuclear-armed Pakistan and India. Yet the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, forbidding  nuclear testing, has failed to win ratification from the U.S. Senate and lawmakers of some other nations. Opponents say scientists cannot reliably detect clandestine tests: Why should we go along, if others can cheat?

Foot Forward

In 1968, 14-year-old Paul Olsen of suburban Livingston, N.J., and his friend Tony Lessa heard that dinosaur tracks had been found in a nearby quarry. They raced over on their bikes.  "I went ballistic," Olsen recalls. Over the next few years, the boys uncovered and studied thousands of tracks and other fossils there, often working into the night.  It opened the world of science to Olsen; he went on to become one of the nation’s leading paleontologists.

Ecosystems Push South in Antarctica

Warming Climate Drives Plankton and Penguins Poleward   

Adélie penguins are flocking closer to the South Pole. A new study in the leading journal Science explains why: they’re following the food supply, which is moving southward with changing climate.

Wind Shifts May Stir CO2 from Antarctic Depths

Releases May Have Speeded End of Last Ice Age—And Could Act Again 

Natural releases of carbon dioxide from the Southern Ocean due to shifting wind patterns could have amplified global warming...

Geologists Map Rocks to Soak CO2 From Air

6,000 Square Miles in U.S. Might Turn Emissions to Harmless Solids 

To slow global warming, scientists are exploring ways to pull carbon dioxide from the air and safely lock it away.

Antarctic Scientists Inaugurate 'Ocean Station Obama'

Aboard R/V  Gould, off Antarctica--Scientists aboard the U.S. research vessel Laurence M Gould, 10,000 miles from Washington off Antarctica, held their own presidential inaugural celebration on Jan. 20.

Wallace Broecker Wins (Yet Another) Top Prize

Climate Scientist Who Sounded Early Warnings Is Still At Work

Wallace S. Broecker, a geochemist at Columbia University’s Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory, has received the newly founded Frontiers of Knowledge Award in Climate Change Research, one of the world’s largest science prizes. An international jury awarded Broecker the $527,000 prize, from Spain’s Banco Bilbao Vizcaya Argentaria Foundation, for sounding early alarms about climate change, and for his pioneering work on how the oceans and atmosphere interact.

Lamont at the American Geophysical Union

Lamont-Doherty scientists are presenting scores of talks at the world’s largest gathering of earth scientists, the fall 2008 meeting of the American Geophysical Union. Subjects include unseen natural hazards, changing climate, the fall of ancient civilizations, and how future mankind might turn atmospheric carbon to stone.

Rocks Could Be Harnessed To Sponge Vast Amounts Of Carbon Dioxide From Air

Proposed Method Would Speed Natural Reactions a Million Times

Scientists say that a type of rock found at or near the surface in the Mideast nation of Oman and other areas around the world could be harnessed to soak up huge quantities of globe-warming carbon dioxide.

Geologist Who Linked Cosmic Strike to Dinosaurs’ Extinction Takes Top Prize

Walter Alvarez, the maverick geologist who convinced a skeptical world that dinosaurs and many other living things on Earth were wiped out by a huge fireball from space, has won the highly esteemed Vetlesen Prize. Considered by many the earth sciences’ equivalent of a Nobel...

Top Science Award Goes to Climate Researcher Wallace Broecker

Balzan Prize Honors Key Insights Into Changes in Oceans, Atmosphere

Geochemist Wallace Broecker has been working on climate questions at Lamont-Doherty for over 50 years.

Earthquakes May Endanger New York More Than Thought, Says Study

Indian Point Nuclear Power Plant Seen As Particular Risk

A study by a group of prominent seismologists suggests that a pattern of subtle but active faults makes the risk of earthquakes to the New York City area much greater than formerly believed.

Undersea Volcanic Rocks May Offer Vast Repository for Greenhouse Gas

Drilling, experiments, target huge formations off West Coast

Palisades, N.Y., July 14, 2008—A group of scientists has used deep ocean-floor drilling and experiments to show that volcanic rocks off the  West Coast and elsewhere might be used to securely imprison huge amounts of globe-warming carbon dioxide captured from power plants or other sources. In particular, they say that natural chemical reactions under 78,000 square kilometers (30,000 square miles) of ocean floor off California, Oregon, Washington and British Columbia could lock in as much as 150 years of U.S. CO2 production