• On August 21, 2017, at 16 points along the path of last year’s total solar eclipse, tiny microphones—each about the size of a USB flash drive—captured a unique biological phenomenon. As Earth fell into complete darkness, the bees stopped buzzing, according to researchers at the University of Missouri

  • A 37-year survey of monarch populations in North Central Florida shows that caterpillars and butterflies have been declining since 1985 and have dropped by 80 percent since 2005.

  • With its wind and precipitation patterns, the South Asian Monsoon influences the lives of several billion people. Recent studies indicate that its drivers are more complex than previously assumed. Scientists from the GEOMAR Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research Kiel have now published a reconstruction of precipitation over the eastern Indian Ocean over the past one million years in the international journal Nature Communications. It points to connections with controlling processes in the southern hemisphere that have received little attention so far.

  • Extreme drought is one of the effects of climate change that is already being perceived.  This year, the decrease in rainfall and the abnormally hot temperatures in northern and eastern Europe have caused large losses in cereals and potato crops and in other horticultural species. Experts have long warned that to ensure food security it is becoming necessary to use plant varieties that are productive in drought conditions. Now, a team led by the researcher at the Center for Research in Agricultural Genomics (CRAG) Ana Caño-Delgado has obtained plants with increased drought resistance by modifying the signaling of the plant steroid hormones, known as brassinosteroids. The study, published in the journal Nature Communications, is the first to find to find a strategy to increase hydric stress resistance without affecting overall plant growth.

  • A team of more than 100 scientists has assessed global warming's impact on thousands of tree species across the Amazon rainforest, assessing the winners and losers from 30 years of climate change.

  • The nation’s average temperature took a dip last month, making it the coolest October since 2013 for the contiguous United States. More rain than normal fell across large parts of the U.S., ending the month as the sixth-wettest October on record.

  • A warmer, drier climate is expected is increase the likelihood of larger-scale forest disturbances such as wildfires, insect outbreaks, disease and drought, according to a new study co-authored by a Portland State University professor.

  • The ozone hole that forms over the Antarctic each September is primarily driven by two factors: the amount of ozone-destroying chlorine in the polar stratosphere and the availability of ice crystals in stratospheric clouds for the chlorine to bind to. This year, the super-cold stratospheric temperatures measured by NOAA and NASA meant conditions were ripe for the development of ice clouds - and a big ozone hole.

  • NASA’s Terra satellite provided a visible image of a more organized Tropical Cyclone Alcide in the Southern Indian Ocean after it reached hurricane-force.

  • North China (35°–40°N, 110°–120°E) is a major region in China for winter wheat agriculture. It is in the spring (March to May) in this region that the reviving, jointing and booting stages of winter wheat mainly happen.