bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
Study of Earth's rotation and geophysical fluids progresses
Authors: Dehant V. , Wilson C. R. , Salstein D. A. , Chao B. F. , Gross R. S. , Provost Ch. Le , Ponte R. M. 
Published: October 2006

Variations in the Earth's speed of rotation and the position and orientation of the rotation axis—known collectively as Earth orientation parameters—are observed by a variety of space geodetic techniques coordinated by the International Earth Rotation Service (IERS). Observations of Earth orientation parameters provide fundamental information about the physical properties of the Earth's interior and the variability of fluids in the atmosphere, oceans, and liquid core, and on land.Participants at a workshop held October 14–18, 1996, at the Paris Observatory, where IERS is headquartered, called for extending IERS activities [Reigber and Feissel, 1997] to include the monitoring of geodetically important properties of the oceans, the liquid core, and terrestrial water to supplement current atmospheric angular momentum variation (AAM) measurements. Given the success of the IERS, expansion of its activities into other areas is not only natural for understanding the observed Earth orientation parameters, but essential for fulfilling its mission of improving the underlying space geodetic observations.
Rock, paper, scissors
Authors: Showstack Randy 
Published: October 2006

Poet William Blake saw the world in a grain of sand. Tau Rho Alpha sees it in tennis balls.Alpha, a research cartographer with the U.S. Geological Survey, plans to serve up about 3,000 donated tennis balls during a September 13 and 14 open house at the agency's Menlo Park, Calif., offices. Along with the fuzzballs come Alpha's instructions for people to paste on paper cut‐outs of a six‐paneled map of the world or one that features its tectonic plates. He says that anybody can cut out the black and white designs, slather them with glue to tennis balls, and color the globes.
Seismographic network provides blueprint for scientific cooperation
Authors: Lane Neal , Eaton Gordon 
Published: October 2006

In the South Atlantic Ocean near Antarctica, ground motion created by a small, distant earthquake is recorded on South Georgia Island. Within hours of the earthquake, the data are automatically collected and made available to all government scientists and university researchers via the Internet. While near‐real time access to seismic data from a remote oceanic island is a great technological accomplishment, the earthquake recorded on South Georgia Island signals a far greater achievement: operation of the 100th station of the Global Seismographic Network (Figure 1).The Global Seismographic Network is a blueprint for scientific programs that not only advance our understanding of the physical world, but also address the needs of society. Funded by both the National Science Foundation (NSF) and the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS), the Global Seismographic Network is now yielding a multi‐use scientific tool that will make it possible for us to explore the Earth's interior, mitigate earthquake hazards, and monitor compliance with the recently signed Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty.
Sojourner rocking and rolling through Pathfinder's extended mission
Authors: Edgett Ken 
Published: October 2006

ARES VALLIS, MARS—With temperatures around −9°C in the mid‐afternoon and down to −75°C at night, northern summer at the Mars Pathfinder landing site is nearing its close. Autumn will begin in about 2 weeks, right about the same time that Pathfinder's orbiting companion, Mars Global Surveyor, will reach the Red Planet.As autumn approaches, the average daily temperatures will continue to decrease, and there is some potential for the winds to pick up. In the 1970s, dust storm season was seen to extend from northern autumn right through winter. In the late 1970s and early 1980s, the Viking 1 lander (which is located about 800 km from Pathfinder) detected changes in atmospheric opacity (that is, how much dust is suspended in the atmosphere) from about the start of autumn and on into the winter. Will Pathfinder see the same? Will strong winds blow through the site and rub out the tire tracks left by the 62‐cm long rover, Sojourner?
For peat's sake
Authors: Showstack Randy 
Published: October 2006

With climate models predicting a sharp increase in global temperature over the coming decades, three scientists are investigating how this warming trend will affect a huge band of peat wetlands that ring the Northern Hemisphere around Alaska, Canada, Scandinavia, and the former Soviet Union.“We are concerned about the impact of a major climate change on these ecosystems with tons of soil carbon,” says Scott Bridgham, a professor at the University of Notre Dame, who is a principal investigator in the study along with Jiquan Chen of Michigan Technological University and John Pastor of the University of Minnesota. Bridgham says that peatlands make up just 2.5% of the Earth's surface but contain about one‐third of its soil carbon pool.
As launch to Saturn nears, plutonium controversy increases
Authors: Showstack Randy 
Published: October 2006

After years of rigorous planning and testing, NASA scientists say they are convinced that the mid‐October launch of the $3.4 billion, plutonium‐powered Cassini mission to Saturn poses nearly no risk to the Earth and will provide an astronomical treasure of information about the sixth rock from the Sun. They say that once the mission reaches the Saturnian neighborhood in the year 2004, it also will offer important insights about the planet's icy rings, and about Titan, Saturn's largest moon, which exhibits atmospheric conditions that may have existed on a primordial Earth.A growing opposition, however, argues that the exploration of Saturn should wait until an alternative electrical generating system is developed. These critics—who include some former NASA employees, scientists, and activists—are concerned that the spacecraft's 72.3 pounds of plutonium 238 poses a potential catastrophic risk to the Earth's population, if the substance is released. Cassini carries the most plutonium ever used on a space mission, and NASA says this is the only means for powering the heavy spacecraft in extremely dim sunlight.
New three‐dimensional viewer runs on common PCs
Authors: van Wees Jan‐Diederik , Kok Gerard 
Published: October 2006

Anybody who has ever worked with interactive three‐dimensional visualization computer applications knows how effective such techniques are for data analysis. Unfortunately these applications are usually expensive and require dedicated graphics work stations that are beyond the reach of most academic institutions. However, new programs that can be run on Pentium systems are bringing high‐end three‐dimensional graphics solutions to a broad audience [see e.g., Flohr, 1996].Two major factors are contributing to this development. First, technical improvements in graphics boards and drivers make highend, three‐dimensional graphics performance possible on low‐cost systems. Second, major improvements are being made in developing standard three‐dimensional graphics languages (for example, OpenGL and Direct3D). These developments allow rapid and effective development of three‐dimensional graphics applications tailored to specific customer needs.
Pettengill receives the Whitten Medal
Authors: Shapiro Irwin , Pettengill Gordon H. 
Published: October 2006

Gordon H. Pettengill was honored as the recipient of the Charles A. Whitten Medal at AGU's Spring Meeting in Baltimore on May 28, 1997. The award is given for outstanding achievements in research on the form and dynamics of the Earth and the planets. The citation and Pettengill's response are given here.“Rock solid” is the best description of Gordon Pettengill's research. Always in the forefront, never trivial, Gordon's publications set the highest standards for scientific content and clarity of presentation. His preparation was equally solid, from an undergraduate physics education at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology to graduate school in physics at the University of California, Berkeley, with only a brief interlude partly spent in Europe in 1944—1945 settling a certain conflict there.
Around the lander in 80 sols
Authors: Edgett Ken 
Published: October 2006

ARES VALLIS, MARS—It's like a whole new landing site. One advantage of Mars Pathfinder over its Viking predecessors is the rover, Sojourner, which is proving to be a capable miniature geologist. Now more than 80 Martian days—called Sols, each of which is approximately 24 hours, 37 minutes long— into the mission, Sojourner continues to provide new perspectives on the Pathfinder landing site. Sojourner is giving the engineering team a wealth of data and experience that will be useful when the next rover reaches the red planet in 2002.A prime example of the new perspectives provided by the rover came on Sol 76 (September 19, 1997), when Sojourner peeked behind the 0.2–0.8 m‐high boulders of the “Rock Garden.” This vista contained a beautiful set of wind‐blown drifts that were not visible to the lander's stereo imaging system (Figure 1). The drifts occur on the downwind (southwest) side of a cluster of imbricated boulders and are analogous to the variety of wind‐tails seen behind cobbles and pebbles throughout the landing site.
40 years after Sputnik, scientists and journalists seek detente
Authors: Showstack Randy 
Published: October 2006

Four decades ago, the Soviet Union lofted a small metal object into orbit around the Earth. It set the United States scurrying into the space race, and helped to spur the ongoing explosion of scientific and technological advances.Sputnik was a good story. It had conflict and drama, and was widely covered in the press. Many other big and small science stories now hit the front pages nearly every day, such as the Mars Pathfinder, global warming, and El Niño.
Holocene climate less stable than previously thought
Authors: deMenocal Peter , Bond Gerard 
Published: October 2006

Until recently, Holocene climate was thought to be extremely stable with none of the abrupt variations that characterize the cold climates of glacial times [Dansgaard et al., 1993]. New terrestrial, marine, and ice core data, however, document abrupt changes during the warm interglacial climate of the last 12,000 years. These newly developed Holocene paleoclimate records indicate that the Holocene was punctuated by a series of millennial‐scale (1000–2000 year) cooling events, the most recent of which was the Little Ice Age (LIA) between approximately 1500 and 1800 A.D.Historical evidence indicates that the estimated ˜1°–2°C LIA ooling was ufficient to choke European ports with sea ice, freeze European rivers (as graphically recorded in the 1565 painting “Winter Landscape” by Pieter Bruegel), force abandonment of Viking colonies in Greenland, and cause glaciers to overrun alpine villages [Bradley and Jones, 1995]. Although these Holocene cooling events were not as large as the well‐known glacial Heinrich events and Dansgaard‐Oeschger climate instabilities [Bond et al., 1996; Dansgaard et al., 1993], they nonetheless document dramatic climate swings during the “climatically stable” Holocene.
The Oceans and Climate
Authors: Green A. W. 
Published: October 2006

The rapid growth and the diversity of global climate research topics are challenges to providing an overview of the field, particularly at an undergraduate level. An instructor who undertakes the challenge to offer an undergraduate course on global climate will lay a plan to convey a basic working knowledge of the principal processes that control global climate, adjusting the goals of the course to the background, interest, and motivation of the students.If the course progresses well, there may be time to extract highlights of recent research results to spark interest and appreciation. Another approach could be to reveal a myriad of processes that contribute to climate change and sketch the grand outline of how they mesh, adding details to give the students a hint of the underpinnings in quantitative science. This approach may offer more academic adventure for student and lecturer, but also more uncertainty.
Friction between science and practice: The case of river restoration
Authors: Wilcock Peter 
Published: October 2006

The growing public awareness that human activities can harm rivers is leading to rapid growth in efforts to restore river channels to some acceptable, if not natural, state. There is a corresponding increase in criticism from the scientific community that such projects are poorly designed and fail too often. Scientists also complain that design practice does not make use of the best available scientific information and feel that they are not listened to.Tension between scientist and practitioner is not new, unusual, or limited to river restoration projects. Practitioners may be inclined to dismiss criticism from those who do not leave their handiwork on the landscape for all to evaluate. This view, however, misses the point that the job of science is not to address particular cases, but to find the general principles that apply to all cases. Also, it is likely that much of the criticism is basically correct (given the advantage of hindsight). The problem is not faulty criticism, nor that scientists do not have the right to criticize. The problem is that the critique is ineffective, if effectiveness is measured in terms of injecting better ideas and reliability into practice.
Scientists and senators call for doubling of science budget
Authors: Showstack Randy 
Published: October 2006

Leaders of 106 scientific and engineering organizations last week called on the U.S. government to double the federal budget for research by the year 2009.The groups, which include AGU and represent about 3 million scientists, engineers, and mathematicians, called for a “decade of investment” in health, environmental, technological and other research, beginning in fiscal year 1999. This request followed a call made earlier this year by about 40 scientific societies and research organizations for a 7% increase in the federal fiscal year 1998 science research budget.
Scientists assess impact of Indonesia fires
Authors: Showstack Randy 
Published: October 2006

The fires burning in Indonesia over the past several months are setting aflame the biomass and wildlife habitat of the tropical forests, spreading a dangerously unhealthy haze across the populous country and nearby nations in southeast Asia, causing transportation hazards, and sending plumes of smoke up into the troposphere.Most of the fires have been set—by big landowners, commercial loggers, and small farmers—in attempts to clear and cultivate the land, as people have done in the past. But this year a drought induced by El Niño limited the rainfall that could help extinguish the flames and wash away the smoke and haze. In addition, some scientists say that smoke could even delay the monsoon, which usually arrives in early November.
Micro studies lead to macro understanding
Authors: Soll W. E. , Tompson A. F. B. , Gray W. G. , Janecky D. R. 
Published: October 2006

In response to renewed interest in studying processes in porous and fractured media at the microscale, 30 researchers from universities, national laboratories, and industry gathered recently for a workshop. The group presented, discussed, debated, and brainstormed ideas to encourage interdisciplinary communication and foster new collaboration among researchers.Current microscale research is driven by our limited ability to reliably measure and describe fluid movement, chemical reactions, and other porous media phenomena at the macroscopic (or continuum) scale level. Real breakthroughs that rigorously translate a knowledge of fundamental fluid behavior, complex mineral surface chemistry, or bacterial activity at the pore scale into better models of processes on a macroscopic scale are lacking. Rather than extending traditional models and approaches, researchers are considering how fundamental pore‐scale processes and physical properties are manifested at the continuum scale. Technological advances are allowing us to visualize, measure, simulate, and analyze processes within the pore spaces and discover their intrinsic relationships to macroscopic behavior.
Congress initiates science study
Authors: Showstack Randy 
Published: October 2006

The U.S. House of Representatives announced in October a year‐long study to review the nation's science and technology policy and the government's role in funding scientific research. The Science Policy Study, led by Rep. Vernon Ehlers (R‐MI), is the first comprehensive review by Congress since 1985—a time when the Cold War still was being fought and the Internet was largely unknown.At a workshop to discuss the initiative, House Science Committee Chair James Sensenbrenner, Jr., told about 30 scientists and policy experts that the challenge is “to develop a new, sensible, coherent long‐range science and technology policy, including a review of our nation's science and math education programs.”
Two more moons found orbiting Uranus
Authors: Showstack Randy 
Published: October 2006

With an hour of free time on the Hale telescope at Mount Palomar, California, last September, a team of astronomers testing a hunch pointed the 5‐M instrument toward Uranus and discovered two previously undetected irregular moons orbiting the planet.The moons are the faintest ever detected from the ground, and they solve a puzzle about Uranus.
U.S. begins merging satellite programs
Authors: Showstack Randy 
Published: October 2006

The U.S. government has moved closer to merging and streamlining two separate environmental satellite programs operated by the Department of Defense (DOD) and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).Earlier this month, the government installed the Integrated Polar Acquisition and Control Subsystem in a Commerce Department facility in Suitland, Maryland. Beginning next summer, the system will operate the two environmental satellites in DOD's Defense Meteorological Satellite Program. Under merger plans, NOAA will be responsible for operating the DOD satellite system as well as its own. The elimination of separate systems could save $678 million through fiscal year 1999, according to James Mannen, Director of the federal government's Integrated Program Office
More rain in the forecast
Authors: Showstack Randy 
Published: October 2006

Global land precipitation has increased during the 20th century, especially at the mid and high latitudes, according to a paper published in the November 1997 issue of the Journal of Climate.The paper, written by NASA scientists Aiguo Dai, Inez Fung, and Anthony Del Genio, is based on a recalibrated compilation and analysis of data from 1900–1988. The paper shows a global land trend of a 2.4 mm per decade increase in annual precipitation amounts, and that rainfall as a global mean has risen by slightly more than 2%. About 22 mm more rain falls now each year than at the turn of the century, the researchers say.
Paleomagnetic lab established in Antarctica
Authors: Florindo Fabio , Sagnotti Leonardo , Roberts Andrew P. , Wilson Gary S. , Verosub Kenneth L. 
Published: October 2006

The world's southernmost paleomagnetic laboratory was established at McMurdo Station, Antarctica, in early October as part of the Cape Roberts Project [Cape Roberts Project International Steering Committee, 1994]. The laboratory's location at McMurdo Station (166°40′10″E, 77°50′18″S) is close to Hut Point, where British explorer Robert Falcon Scott established a base in the early 1900s.The facility is housed in two rooms at the Albert P. Crary Science and Engineering Center. From the laboratory, there is a superb view of southern McMurdo Sound with Black Island, Minna Bluff, Mt. Discovery to the south (where Scott's expedition for the South Pole first traversed), and the Royal Society Range of the Transantarctic Mountains. The lab is equipped with two spinner magnetometers, a thermal demagnetizer, an alternating field demagnetizer, a susceptibility meter, and an impulse magnetizer.
Outstanding student paper award
Authors: Anonymous  
Published: October 2006

The Atmospheric Sciences Section (AS) presented four Outstanding Student Paper Awards at the AGU 1997 Spring Meeting in Baltimore last May.Francine Jaskiewicz presented a paper titled “Variability in the Organization of Tropical Convection, and its Effects on the Global Atmospheric Circulation.” Jaskiewicz graduated from the University of Pennsylvania in 1994 with a B.A. in art history. She received an M.S. in meteorology from the Pennsylvania State University in August 1997.
Offshore pollution paradox
Authors: Showstack Randy 
Published: October 2006

A new discovery by a team of scientists at the University of California at Santa Barbara could provide offshore gas and oil production with a cleaner image. The scientists have found that gas and oil flowing from natural vents in the ocean floor off campus contribute significantly to air pollution. In addition, theyfound that offshore drilling actually can decrease that pollution.“The amount of gas seepage is about equal to the amounts estimated for tailpipe emissions by government agencies in Santa Barbara County,” says geophysics professor and chief investigator Bruce Luyendyk. The 2‐year study, which focused on gas production, found that 3.5 million to 7 million cubic feet of natural gas are released from the nearby ocean floor every day. This makes the study area the world's second biggest region—after the Caspian Sea—where such seepage has been found.
Promoting innovations in geoscience education
Authors: Showstack Randy 
Published: October 2006

Kenneth Verosub often begins a new semester of teaching geology courses at the University of California at Davis by having students stand on their chairs while he climbs on top of his desk. Actor Robin Williams, in the film “Dead Poets Society,” used this ploy to encourage students to think creatively, and Verosub's students invariably understand the visual reference.From his perch several feet above the floor, the mustachioed Verosub tells students, “I want you to get a different perspective on how to learn in a science class.”
Spacecraft observations featured at Solar Symposium
Authors: Shea M. A. , Smart D. F. 
Published: October 2006

Participants at a symposium on solar phenomena that affect interplanetary space and the Earth's outer environment eagerly received new results from the Solar and Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO) spacecraft, launched in December 1995. Dedicated to solar observations, this spacecraft is providing almost revolutionary new information about the Sun.Implications of the apparent ejection of solar mass material over a 180° angle are difficult to omprehend. Initial results of the three coronagraphs on the SOHO spacecraft (LASCO experiment) represent a significant advance in observing and modeling the quiet solar corona. Many participants admired the composite model to 30 solar radii as a spectacular technical achievement. Oxygen velocity profiles were presented as a function of radial distance within polar plumes, which appear to be associated with unipolar magnetic field regions and may have significant implications related to the source of the coronal hole high‐speed streams.
Le Mouel receives Fleming Medal
Authors: Backus George , Le Mouël Jean‐Louis 
Published: October 2006

Jean‐Louis Le Mouel was awarded the John Adam Fleming Medal at the AGU Fall Meeting Honors Ceremony, which was held on December 10, 1997, in San Francisco, California. The Fleming Medal recognizes original research and technical leadership in geomagnetism, atmospheric electricity, aeronomy, and related sciences. The citation and response are given here.Jean‐Louis Le Mouel is among our century's most effective geomagneticians. It reflects much credit on the AGU that he is now a Fleming Medalist. He has made many significant contributions to the collection, analysis, and interpretation of magnetic data and has solved several long‐outstanding theoretical problems.