Current Event #5 Floods in Texas

Environmental Science Current Event

The Floods in Texas
http://www.livescience.com/50980-texas-oklahoma-flooding-cause-el-nino.html

Due to heavy rainfall on Saturday, May 23, Texas and Oklahoma had been experiencing major flash floods and also tornado warnings that led to 10 people dead and a thousand of other residents of that area being evacuated. According to the article from "Live Science," these disasters were caused by an El Nino pattern. Which is known as a natural climate cycle that brings warmer than average temperatures to the Pacific Ocean. Where in this case this pattern split apart, making these temperatures go one way north and one way south. These disasters also affected the drought situation in California because the storm came from the Pacific, passed California and Mexico and then led to Texas. This created the solution to the drought by replenishing lakes and other dry areas an this should happen in the next 4 months. This topic relates back to of what I learned in environmental science class about the water cycle of it is a continues cycle of taking and giving back the water. This disaster proved the giving back part and also gave back rainfall to California.

Question for Partner:
How would California change if this rainfall stayed consistent for the next 4 months?

Current Event #4 Inge Lehman's 127th Birthday

Environmental Science Current Event

Inge Lehman's 127th Birthday

http://www.csmonitor.com/Science/2015/0513/Google-celebrates-Inge-Lehmann-discoverer-of-Earth-s-inner-core


On May 13 in the year 1888, a woman was born who was one of the greatest minds at the time. She was known for her work in geological findings that could of been impossible to find for other. That finding was the inner and the outer core of the Earth. The scientist known as Inge Lehman used a modern day seismometer that was relevant to her time, to detect earthquakes with increasing a accuracy. Into the later 20th century, her work was intrigued by a seismologist named Beno Gutenburg. Gutenburg then calculated the P-waves and S-waves, to figure out of how everything was moving. Such as how the ocean and continents were moving. Relating back to my Environmental Science class, we learned of how, in Geology, there are different layers of the Earth and where we stand on is the Lithosphere. Then going all the way down, deep into the our planet, would be of course, the outer and inner core.

Question for Partner:
To what you learned from the article, what are the benefits to the use of seismometers to know when an earthquake is detected and how can we take that idea further?    

Environmental Science Current Event-3, Risk for Species Extinction

Regions at Greatest Risk for Species Extinction 
Summary by Charles Clark

Link to article:
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/04/150430225703.htm

As it was said on April 30th, scientists at the University of Connecticut have figured out that a certain percentage of species will become extinct due to mass global temperature changes that could happen through the years. As Mark Urban explains in the article, that his study predicts that 3 percent species extinction rate rate based on current conditions. For example, if the earth warms another 3 degrees Celsius, than the extinction rates rises to 8.5 percent. Then soon by the year 2100, the extinction risk will rise up to 16 percent if this type of temperature change will still continue. According to Urban's studies, these effects of climate change have centered on North America and Europe. Although the Southern parts of the world such as South America, Australia, and New Zealand are at greatest risk for species loss. This is because those continents have unique climate ranges and many of the species their can only survive in that type of range. This topic centers around the biosphere because it deals with species becoming extinct and for some of them down south they are considered specialist species because they can only with stand that one climate range. This would also include the affects of climate change that affects the biosphere as well.

Question for Partner:
What can we do to save the species from extinction before the extinction risk gets to a higher percentage by 2100?

Current Event 2_Climate Changes in Greenland and in Antarctica

Climate Changes in Greenland and in Antarctica

By Charles Clark

Link to article:
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/04/150429132920.htm

This article mentions the abrupt climate changes that has been happening between Greenland and Antarctica. Not just that their climates are getting colder, but their climates are actually getting warmer and/or cooler between each other. This change has been going on for a 200-year period, which is kind of odd considering that ocean circulation keeps their climates normal. Although the ocean currents coming towards Greenland and Antarctica are coming from the tropical climates. Which means that Greenland and Antarctica are in those sweet spots that allows those tropical ocean currents to warm up the land. The way they stay cool before the tropical ocean current come in, are their ice cores. For each ice core, that's where it mostly snows which keeps the cores cold and pack in underground with the snow on top as well. For environmental science purposes, it consists of the topic on biomes, including the cold desert. Another topic that the article consists of is climate change because it talks about how Greenland is getting warmer and how Antarctica is getting cooler and vice versa.

Question for partner from the article:
What does AMOC stand for and how does it relate back to the climate changes between the northern and southern hemispheres?