Ghost Forests: Are they as scary as they sound?

Sea level rise has been accelerating over the last century, which will impact coastal ecosystems and their animals. Scientists have set out to study the conversion of forests to wetlands that is occurring with sea level rise, which results in the formation of ghost forests. While the loss of these forests is problematic, the resulting gain in wetland may actually be beneficial, making ghost forests less scary than they sound.

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Salty about coastal walls

Artificial barriers are one of humans favorite thing to build. We build them to keep ‘other’ people in or out. We build them to keep animals in or out. And of course we build them to keep the natural environment out or our AC in. Usually walls are just temporary solutions to a much deeper problem which is definitely true in the case of sea level rise. Coastal communities need walls to protect against flooding. But what happens when to the impounded ecosystem when mother nature crashes through the wall anyway?

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Voyage to Iceberg Alley

A couple of days ago, right around sunrise, we sailed out of the Straits of Magellan and into the southern Atlantic Ocean, bound for the Southern Ocean and the Antarctic waters known as Iceberg Alley. Giant petrels soared against a clear blue sky, and gentle waves rocked the ship—although we didn’t expect that to last! I am aboard the JOIDES Resolution, a research vessel and drilling ship, and we are intentionally sailing into some of the planet’s wildest seas and the area of greatest iceberg concentration in the Antarctic.

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How the Driest Regions on the Planet Add to Sea Level Rise

Terrestrial water loss is a major contributor to water stress around the world. Areas that are hydrologically isolated tend to lose water twice as fast as other regions. But where does that water go? New evidence is showing that water from the driest regions on the planet may have a consequential impact on global sea level rise.

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What gives glacier algae their wild colors?

When a British expedition reported seeing pink mountain snow in 1818, the London Times said: “Our credulity is put to an extreme test upon this occasion, but we cannot learn that there is any reason to doubt the fact as stated.” Two hundred years later, we now can confirm that pink snow (“watermelon snow”) is real and it is caused by certain types of algae. But why is it that snow algae take on such distinctive red and purple colors? And how does this connect to melting glaciers or global sea level rise?

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