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Venus and Earth have remarkably different surface conditions, yet the lithospheric thickness and heat flow on Venus may be Earth-like. This finding supports a tectonic regime with limited surface mobility and dominated by intrusive magmatism.
Widespread injection of deep water from the Barents Sea into the Nansen Basin makes a substantial contribution to carbon sequestration in the Arctic Ocean, and feeds the deep sea community.
Regional recovery from microplastic pollution-induced marine deoxygenation may take hundreds of years, according to a combination of biogeochemical and microplastic modelling.
Marine phosphate levels and biological productivity were lowest during the early Phanerozoic when seafloor weathering rates were high and continental weathering rates were muted, according to a statistical model of coupled elemental cycles.
Manganese oxidation experiments in Mars-like fluids suggest that chlorate and bromate may have been more effective oxidants of manganese on early Mars than atmospheric oxygen and explain observed manganese oxide deposits.
Substantial nitrous oxide production in the epipelagic zone of the subtropical ocean partially offsets carbon sequestration by the marine biological pump, according to observations from the South China Sea and subtropical northwest Pacific.
Mixing dynamics at river confluences where shallow flows merge in rivers consist of switching between wake and mixing-layer modes, as shown in theoretical and field-scale physical modelling.
Carbon sequestration by Siberian forests has been low over the past decade due to disturbances that have decreased live biomass and increased dead wood, according to passive microwave observations.
East Antarctic surface temperature co-varied with local insolation in the Early Pleistocene, leading to the cancellation of global orbital ice sheet forcing from precession, according to temperature proxies and insolation-related gas ratios in ice cores.
The biological processes that control the release of carbon stored in land are dependent on water availability. A global analysis of temperature sensitivity reveals how hydrometeorological processes modulate the response of land carbon turnover to temperature.
Mediation by iron minerals in the non-biological production of nitrous and nitric oxides may have driven the nitrogen cycle in the Archean ocean. This system may also have shaped the function and composition of the early marine ecosystem.
Marine phytoplankton both follow and actively influence the environment they inhabit. Unpacking the complex ecological and biogeochemical roles of these tiny organisms can help reveal the workings of the Earth system.
Earth’s most abundant mineral — bridgmanite — lies hidden in the lower mantle, but Li Zhang is hopeful that advances in analytical techniques may reveal the inner workings of our world.
Anthropogenic nitrogen deposition is known to affect forest soil respiration, but it remains unclear how soil respiration responds to nitrogen deposition over time. Monitoring of CO2 emissions over 9–13 years of nitrogen-addition treatments in three tropical forests in southern China reveals a three-phase pattern of soil respiration.
Analyses of the temperature sensitivity of terrestrial carbon turnover suggest that hydrometeorology and temperature control the spatial variability in carbon turnover times globally.
Marine emissions of N2O could have sustained an early Archaean atmosphere of 0.8–6.0 ppb N2O without a protective ozone layer, according to mineral incubations combined with diffusion and photochemical modelling.