A recent study has mathematically clarified how the presence of crystals and gas bubbles in magma affects the propagation of seismic P-waves. The researchers derived a new equation that characterizes the travel of these waves ...
Soft Matter
May 21, 2025
0
0
When a volcano erupts, it can spew ash high into the atmosphere—inserting aerosols right where clouds typically form. How exactly these aerosols impact cloud formation has long been a mystery to atmospheric scientists.
Earth Sciences
May 21, 2025
0
2
Analysis has shown a boulder weighing almost 1,200 tons in Tonga is one of the largest known wave-transported rocks in the world, providing new insights into the Pacific region's history and risk of tsunamis.
Earth Sciences
May 21, 2025
0
0
On our planet, the cycle and balance of carbon from reservoir to reservoir is a matter of life or death. Carbon moves from the atmosphere to the ocean, to carbon-based life forms, to rocks or sediments, and it can be tied ...
Earth Sciences
May 21, 2025
0
12
A team of atmospheric scientists at the University of Washington has found evidence that weather forecasters may be able to look ahead for up to 30 days when making predictions. In their study, posted on the arXiv preprint ...
Scientists know that changing tree leaves can indicate when a nearby volcano is becoming more active and might erupt. In a new collaboration between NASA and the Smithsonian Institution, scientists now believe they can detect ...
Earth Sciences
May 15, 2025
1
1
A restive volcano in central Philippines briefly erupted Tuesday, spewing a 4.5-kilometer (2.8-mile) ash plume and debris into the sky as its rumblings were heard nearby.
Environment
May 13, 2025
0
1
It had been dormant for 800 years, but in March 2021, the Fagradalsfjall volcano in Iceland came to life. While the eruption was ongoing, large-scale field experiments were conducted to build defensive earthen barriers aimed ...
Earth Sciences
May 8, 2025
0
1
Hundreds of millions of people live in areas that could be affected by volcanic eruptions. Fortunately, clues at the surface, such as earthquakes and ground deformation, can indicate movement within underground magma dikes—sheets ...
Earth Sciences
Apr 30, 2025
0
13
The Reykjanes Peninsula at Iceland's southwestern edge is one of the country's most populated regions, and it is also one of the most volcanically active. In 2024, sensing technology developed at Caltech was deployed in the ...
Earth Sciences
Apr 25, 2025
0
19
A volcano is an opening, or rupture, in a planet's surface or crust, which allows hot, molten rock, ash, and gases to escape from below the surface. Volcanic activity involving the extrusion of rock tends to form mountains or features like mountains over a period of time. The word volcano is derived from the name of Vulcano island off Sicily. In turn, it was named after Vulcan, the Roman god of fire.
Volcanoes are generally found where tectonic plates are diverging or converging. A mid-oceanic ridge, for example the Mid-Atlantic Ridge, has examples of volcanoes caused by divergent tectonic plates pulling apart; the Pacific Ring of Fire has examples of volcanoes caused by convergent tectonic plates coming together. By contrast, volcanoes are usually not created where two tectonic plates slide past one another. Volcanoes can also form where there is stretching and thinning of the Earth's crust (called "non-hotspot intraplate volcanism"), such as in the African Rift Valley, the Wells Gray-Clearwater volcanic field and the Rio Grande Rift in North America and the European Rhine Graben with its Eifel volcanoes.
Volcanoes can be caused by mantle plumes. These so-called hotspots, for example at Hawaii, can occur far from plate boundaries. Hotspot volcanoes are also found elsewhere in the solar system, especially on rocky planets and moons.
This text uses material from Wikipedia, licensed under CC BY-SA
