An Off-Road Itinerary
This month, we cover the work of scientists stepping out of their labs and into the field, from rugged lava expanses and volcanic summits to arid ice sheets and lake beds.
Discovering Venus on Iceland
Scientists trekked across Icelandic lava flows that served as stand-ins for Venus’s volcanic landscapes, testing tools and methods the upcoming VERITAS mission will use when it reaches the planet.
Coral Diversity Drops as Ocean Acidifies
As seawater becomes steadily more acidic, complex branching corals die off and are replaced with hard boulder corals and algae.
These South Pole Seismometers Will Detect Vibrations 1.5 Miles Under the Ice
The instruments will freeze into Antarctica’s ice sheet, where they will collect detailed, global-scale seismic data.
Eastern Africa Is Splitting Apart, but Not Where We Expected
The Turkana Rift Zone in Kenya entered a critical stage in continental breakup about 4 million years ago.
Sensing the Sounds from Earth’s Hazardous Environments
Low-cost infrasound sensors, deployed in large numbers, provide a practical means of data collection near volcanoes, earthquakes, wildfires, and other geophysical phenomena.