Scientists are tackling “the most profound questions about life itself” with complex computer modeling, billion-year-old bacteria, and old-fashioned fieldwork.
iron
Posted inNews
Bacteria Battled for Iron in Earth’s Early Oceans
Billions of years ago, iron-oxidizing microbes may have competed for dissolved iron in the ocean, with some strains producing toxic gases that smothered their rivals.
Posted inEditors' Highlights
The Future of Martian Paleomagnetism
Samples collected by the Perseverance Rover have great potential for providing insights into the history of Mars’ magnetic field.
Posted inNews
Saharan Dust Carries Iron That Feeds Life in the Distant Ocean
A new study of seafloor sediments suggests reactions in the atmosphere convert dust-borne iron into forms more readily taken up by phytoplankton.
Posted inNews
Iron-Rich Volcanoes Hold Hidden Rare Earth Element Reserves
Experiments show how concentrations of rare earth elements, critical to the green energy transition, might be hiding in plain sight in iron-rich deposits around the world.
Posted inResearch Spotlights
Microbes Likely Form Magnetite in the South China Sea
Researchers sampled sediment cores and found that where magnetite was abundant, methane-producing bacteria were as well.
Posted inEditors' Highlights
Greenland Could Have Records of 3.7-billion-year-old Geomagnetic Fields
Scientists argue that paleomagnetic field tests preserve a geomagnetic field record acquired as chemical remnant magnetization in banded iron formations in southwest Greenland.
Posted inScience Updates
The Open Ocean, Aerosols, and Every Other Breath You Take
Phytoplankton and other marine plants produce half of Earth’s atmospheric oxygen and have big effects on food webs and climate. To do so, they rely on nutrients from the sky that are hard to quantify.
Posted inResearch Spotlights
Iron Snow Ebb and Flow May Cause Magnetic Fields to Come and Go
Lab experiments find that iron crystals in planetary cores may form in bursts, causing periodic dynamos.