Researchers drove around a van outfitted with a sensitive mass spectrometer to measure airborne chemicals weeks after the disaster.
spectroscopy
Posted inNews
As Wildfires Grow, So Could Methane Emissions
Wildfires that wreaked havoc on California in 2020 filled the atmosphere with a potent greenhouse gas.
Posted inEditors' Vox
Using Cave Formations to Investigate Ancient Wildfires
From sediment cores to speleothems, environmental archives are helping us to understand the history of wildfires.
Posted inNews
Newly Discovered Salts May Exist on Icy Moons
For the first time in more than a century, scientists have identified new sodium chloride crystals. The discovery may reconcile puzzling spectroscopic images of Europa’s surface.
Posted inNews
UV Radiation Contributed to Earth’s Biggest Mass Extinction
To find the first direct evidence of heightened UV radiation during the end-Permian mass extinction, researchers turned to chemical evidence preserved in pollen grains.
Posted inENGAGE, News
Community Scientists Recover Micrometeorites from Lake Michigan
A team of scientists, educators, and teenagers discovered the objects, some of which may have been delivered by a fireball that streaked across the sky in 2017.
Posted inResearch Spotlights
A Unified Atmospheric Model for Uranus and Neptune
In a new model, three substantial atmospheric layers appear consistent between the ice giants.
Posted inENGAGE, News
Asteroid May Be a Chip off the Old Moon
Spectral data suggest that Kamo‘oalewa, a near-Earth asteroid, has a composition similar to lunar rocks.
Posted inNews
Lasers Have the Makings of a 21st-Century Geoscience Tool
Laser-induced breakdown spectroscopy is a versatile geochemical tool being used in a wide range of applications, from Mars rovers to earthly rock identification.
Posted inResearch Spotlights
Tree Rings Show Record of Newly Identified Extreme Solar Activity Event
Mass spectroscopy of tree ring material indicates a sharp, single-year rise in carbon-14 concentrations consistent with an extreme solar energetic particle event that occurred around 5410 BCE.