Climate change will exacerbate the food, energy, water, health, and equity challenges that urban communities face, but cities also have opportunities to improve sustainability and outcomes.
Science Updates
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Critical Agents of Change at Earth’s Surface
By way of agriculture and industry, humans have major influences on the critical zone. Our past and present effects on the landscape, soil, and water will echo for a long time to come.
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Soil Signals Tell of Landscape Disturbances
The lasting influence humans have on Earth’s critical zone—and how geologic forces have mediated those influences—is revealed in studies of soil and carbon migration.
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Life Teems Below the Surface
Scientists are resolving how plants, microbes, and lithology sculpt the structure of the critical zone.
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Exploring by Boring: Geothermal Wells as Research Tools
As part of an effort to develop a geothermal energy source beneath its campus, Cornell University is planning to probe the “boring” old continental crust upon which many people live.
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Planning a Sustainable Future for Earth’s Oceans
Ocean experts are engaged in a long-term effort to envision, develop, and implement best practices for meeting today’s needs while preserving ocean resources for future generations.
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Measuring, Monitoring, and Modeling Ecosystem Cycling
Scientists leverage long-term environmental measurements, emerging satellite observations, and recent modeling advances to examine changes in ecosystem carbon and water cycling.
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Ancient Rivers and Critical Minerals in Eastern Alaska
Fieldwork is revealing a history of landscape evolution over the past 5 million years that links climate change and river capture to critical mineral resources across the Alaska-Yukon border.
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Eyes in the Sky Improve Pollen Tracking
Physicians, public health officials, and experts in remote sensing and ecology recently met to identify ways that satellites, webcams, and crowdsourced science could help them manage asthma and allergies.
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Earth Observations Inform Cities’ Operations and Planning
Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, and Chicago, Ill., are using NASA Earth observations to map, monitor, and forecast water and air quality, urban heat island effects, landslide risks, and more.