Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain
the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in
Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles
and JavaScript.
Scientific confidence in climate change effects is much higher for aspects related to global patterns of surface temperature, than for circulation. Circulation will remain hard to predict, necessitating a risk-based approach to decision making.
In order to limit climate warming, CO2 emissions must remain below fixed quota. An evaluation of past emissions suggests that at 2014 emissions rates, the total quota will probably be exhausted within the next 30 years.
Freshwater deficits and heavy rainfall have been projected to intensify in a warming climate. An analysis of hydrological data suggests that past changes in wet and dry extremes were more complex than a simple amplification of existing patterns.
Jupiter's icy moon Europa is criss-crossed by extensional features. A tectonic reconstruction suggests that Europa's extension is balanced by subduction — if so, Earth may not be the only planetary body with a plate tectonic system.
In 2004, a phase transition was discovered in the most abundant lower-mantle mineral. A decade of focused experiments, computations and seismic imaging stimulated by this discovery has revealed previously unknown complexities in Earth's deep mantle.
The release of large quantities of methane from ocean sediments might affect global climate change. The discovery of expansive methane seeps along the US Atlantic margin provides an ideal test bed for such a marine methane–climate connection.
The topography of the Earth's surface can be read as an archive of past climatic and tectonic upheavals. Field data reveal how a bedrock gorge may be erased within a human lifetime, taking with it the evidence of a major earthquake.
The Arctic has warmed more than twice as fast as the global average. A literature synthesis discusses mechanisms how the associated decline in sea ice and snow cover could potentially alter mid-latitude weather, but uncertainties are profound.
Multicellular animals probably evolved at the seafloor after a rise in oceanic oxygen levels. Biogeochemical model simulations suggest that as these animals started to rework the seafloor, they triggered a negative feedback that reduced global oxygen.
Particles of smoke from natural and human-made fires absorb sunlight and contribute to global warming. Laboratory experiments suggest that smoke is often more absorbing than current numerical models of global climate assume.
Sandstone arches and other striking landforms are the showpieces of national parks around the globe. Experiments and numerical analyses show that they result from a self-organization process that involves vertical load, wind erosion and grain locking.
The global ocean overturning circulation relies on dense deep waters being mixed back up to the surface. An observational analysis shows that turbulent mixing in the abyss around Antarctica varies with the strength of surface eddies and thus probably also wind speeds.
Southwest Australia has become increasingly dry over the past century. Simulations with a high-resolution global climate model show that this trend is linked to greenhouse gas emissions and ozone depletion — and that it is likely to continue.
The removal of trace gases from the troposphere is, in most cases, initialized by reactions with hydroxyl radicals. An evaluation of this process (sometimes termed self-cleansing) using existing observations from environments with different atmospheric compositions suggests that it runs at maximum efficiency.
During the early Pliocene epoch, tropical sea surface temperatures were thought to be similar to those of today, even though global mean temperatures were several degrees warmer. Temperature reconstructions now suggest that the Pliocene tropical warm pools were about two degrees warmer than those at present.
The Indonesian seas provide the only connection between ocean basins in the tropics. A review of observational data and model results concludes that vertical mixing determines the physical properties of water in the Indonesian throughflow.
