Source: AGU Advances CubeSats are satellites constructed of cubic units, or U, a bit smaller than a square tissue box, or about 10 centimeters (about 4 inches) on each side. (A 2U CubeSat, for instance, is about the size of a rectangular tissue box.) Initially developed 2 decades ago as an inexpensive platform for students to learn about satellite development, CubeSats weren’t thought of as devices for collecting valuable data. However, these tiny satellites can capture high-quality information and measurements that make them useful for students and scientists alike. Li describes two student-l ..read more

Source: Journal of Geophysical Research: Solid Earth When a fault ruptures in nature, some sections of the fault slip suddenly and seismically, weakening as velocity increases. Other regions creep slowly and strengthen with increasing velocity. The relative locations of these sections affect the size and nature of seismic activity along the fault. In one common configuration, a velocity-weakening section is surrounded by a velocity-strengthening section, which stops the spread of ruptures. Scientists use multiple techniques, including modeling and laboratory experiments, to re-create and bette ..read more

Editors’ Highlights are summaries of recent papers by AGU’s journal editors. Source: Journal of Geophysical Research: Solid Earth Paleomagnetism from the continental geological record is the only quantitative tool for uncovering pre-Mesozoic continent positions. It is crucial for studying geodynamics across deep time and understanding paleoclimate and life evolution. Yet, Earth’s tectonic shifts make older rock samples rare, limiting the available ancient-rock datasets. Additionally, rocks often undergo remagnetization, where their original magnetic signature is lost, a phenomenon that is more ..read more

Source: Water Resources Research As climate change continues to warm the planet, scientists expect natural hazards such as flooding to increase. Urban flooding can be caused by extreme precipitation events, storm surges, or high tides, with dangerous and expensive consequences for public health and infrastructure. Urban flooding hazards are complicated by the heterogeneity of cities—various types of land use, development, surfaces, and drainage systems can all change how water moves. Flooding can be localized to areas as specific as a block or a street corner and change quickly, making it diff ..read more

The Landslide Blog is written by Dave Petley, who is widely recognized as a world leader in the study and management of landslides. On 7 May 2024 a peat landslide occurred in Shetland, northern Scotland at the site of the under construction Viking Energy wind farm site. The landslide was captured on a video that has been widely circulated on social media, and is the subject of a BBC News article too. The footage should be visible on the Youtube video below:- There is also a really good set of drone footage showing the aftermath of the landslide, posted to Youtube by Gary Buchan:- According ..read more

Source: Journal of Geophysical Research: Biogeosciences Does life exist beyond Earth? One of the most compelling places to consider this possibility is Enceladus, a moon of Saturn with a liquid water ocean encased in a frozen shell. There, plumes of water spray from ice fractures into space, and spacecraft observations of these geysers suggest that Enceladus has all the chemical building blocks necessary for life. It is no surprise that robotic missions to search for life on Enceladus are in development. On the brink of this new era of space exploration, Davila and Eigenbrode propose a strateg ..read more

For decades, scientists have been intrigued by a strange twist in the Moon’s history. Toward its last stages of formation, the lunar mantle likely flipped: Minerals that had formed at the top sank to its bottom, in a process called lunar mantle overturn. The idea emerged from simulations based on the analysis of lunar rocks brought back by the Apollo missions, but a new study published in Nature Geoscience offers the first evidence supporting this theory. Four and a half billion years ago, a collection of gases and rocks—remnants of a massive collision between Earth and another object—coalesc ..read more

This is an authorized translation of an Eos article. Esta es una traducción al español autorizada de un artículo de Eos. Hace décadas, entre los principales impedimentos para abordar el cambio climático se incluían la polarización política y el coste elevado de una tecnología verde relativamente poco eficiente. En la actualidad, energía limpia y eficaz está disponible a precios razonables en muchos lugares, hasta el punto de que las empresas de combustibles fósiles se están convirtiendo en pasivos de inversión, según el Instituto de Economía Energética y Análisis Fina ..read more

Editors’ Highlights are summaries of recent papers by AGU’s journal editors. Source: Journal of Advances in Modeling Earth Systems Future urban energy demand projections are subject to considerable uncertainty brought upon by climate change, socioeconomic development, and our adaptation to climate change. Existing tools have not been able to fully capture the global-to-local scale interactions between climate change and energy use (see figure above) which harms our climate preparedness and action. Li et al. [2024] develop an explicit air-conditioning (AC) adoption scheme in the Community Earth ..read more

Editors’ Vox is a blog from AGU’s Publications Department. Planetary Sciences holds a special place at AGU. The discipline covers every one of AGU’s scientific topics, specifying only that it should be applicable to planets besides the Earth. Journal of Geophysical Research: Planets serves the community of the Planetary Sciences Section of AGU and needs to cover that immense breadth. We published papers that examine the plasma of the Earth-Moon system, the atmosphere of Jupiter, the geobiology of ancient Mars, the cryosphere of Mars, surface processes on Titan, geodesy of the Moon, the health ..read more