Geomagnetic storms induce fast plasma flows next to the aurora and affect space weather. Lin et al. explain the origin of a special “dawnside” plasma stream that occurs only during extreme storm events.
AGU Advances
Why Does It Rain So Much Over Tropical Land?
Analyses of observations show that tropical land receives more rain than its fair share, owing to a proposed negative feedback that is not captured in current climate models.
The Long-Lasting Impact of a Nuclear War on the Ocean
Model simulations of the impact of a large-scale nuclear war reveal long lasting effects with much of the ocean not returning to pre-war levels despite the cessation of the initial cooling.
Oceans Warming Increases Xinjiang’s Precipitation, but Scarcity Stays
A transition toward an unusually wet condition due to ocean surface warming-induced increased precipitation will not alleviate the water scarcity risk in Xinjiang, China.
New Tool to Decipher Past Upper Troposphere Temperatures
Small variations in clumped O2 isotopes reflect temperatures in the upper troposphere. Bubbles measured in polar ice cores show the global lapse-rate appears to steepen during the Last Glacial Maximum.
A Burning Issue
California has lost 7% of its forest cover to climate change over the past 25 years.
Ceres: Missing Craters, Crust Thickness Variation by Interior Convection
Models show that several puzzling features about Ceres’ topography, gravity anomalies, and crater size distribution may be explained by asymmetric hemispherical convection due to radiogenic heating.
Zircons and Plate Tectonics
New data on ancient zircons points to a transition from stagnant lid to subduction style tectonics at 3.6 Ga ago.
Less Air Travel May Partially Contribute to Global Warming
Decrease in aircraft soot emission, as shown by COVID-19 lockdown, leads to a significant increase in ice crystal number in cirrus clouds, and results in a small global positive radiative effect.
Ice Begets Ice in the Clouds of the Southern Ocean
Poorly understood ice multiplication processes, not aerosols, may determine the microphysical properties of climatologically important clouds over the Southern Ocean.