Climate Change Evolution
Who benefits from more CO2? Harmful algae.
Climate change will produce both winners and losers, but we might not like who ends up winning! New research shows…
Author: Michael Philben
I recently completed a PhD in Marine Science at the University of South Carolina and am now a postdoc at Memorial University of Newfoundland. I research the effects of climate change on soil organic matter in boreal forests and peatlands. I spend my free time picking berries and exploring “The Rock” (Newfoundland).
Biogeochemistry Climate Change
Do coral reefs help fight climate change?
Coral reefs are called the rainforests of the sea for their stunning biodiversity. But can they, like forests on land,…
Biogeochemistry
The Dirty Blizzard: how oil from the Deepwater Horizon spill reached the seafloor
Oil floats on water, yet oil spills are still devastating for marine life living on the seafloor. How does it…
Biogeochemistry
Why iron fertilization hasn’t worked
Fertilizing the ocean with iron to help algae store more carbon in the deep sea was once heralded as a…
Biogeochemistry
Dust detectives: tracing the origins of Antarctic ice core debris
Tiny dust particles punch above their weight by delivering nutrients to remote ecosystems. A new study uses the chemical fingerprint…
Climate Change ocean engineering
Manipulating ship wakes to reflect light could help fight climate change
The tiny bubbles produced by ship’s wakes reflect light and cool the planet. Could they be manipulated to counteract global…
Climate Change ocean engineering
A cloudy future for climate engineering
Pumping reflective aerosols into the atmosphere may hold promise for cooling the climate. But once we start, we won’t be…
Climate Change
Was the California drought the worst in history?
California has seen longer droughts and drier years in the past, but a new reconstruction shows that 2012-2015 was the…
Archaeology Methodology
How we broke radiocarbon dating
CO2 from fossil fuel burning doesn’t contain C-14. That’s bad news for the future of radiocarbon dating.
Biogeochemistry
Oil spill first responders: how tiny algae cultivate oil-degrading bacteria
After an oil spill, millions of oil-degrading bacteria are on the scene almost immediately. But how do they survive in…
Biogeochemistry
Estimating carbon sequestration from plankton poop
Copepod fecal pellets—plankton poop—transport carbon from the ocean surface to the deep where it is stored for thousands of years.…
Biogeochemistry
Microbes foil attempts to increase deep ocean carbon sequestration
Most carbon emitted to the atmosphere ends up in the ocean, much of it in organic molecules. While most is…