Back in the 1800s, rivers were the highways of the times. But waterfalls – like St. Anthony Falls on the Mississippi river – provided significant obstacles for boats, their passengers, and their cargo. In Minnesota, the “twin” cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul...

It’s that time of year again in North America - when hurricane season starts – and the outlook for summer 2022 is an above-average season. The prediction, according to NOAA (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration) is anywhere from 3 – 6 major ones expected...

Muir Woods National Monument is home to some of the tallest trees on Earth: the coastal redwoods there measure in at 260 feet tall, or, the height of a 24-story building. But they can top out at nearly 400 feet! The trees grow in the moderate temperatures along the...

Temperatures here in Colorado have been soaring into the mid-80s – in May! Severe flooding and landslides have been devastating South Africa; the eastern Australia floods of 2022 have been some of the worst recorded flood disasters; India and the Himalaya are...

Tis the season! For science fairs, that is. Springtime is science fair season, when thousands of students across the country, from elementary to high school, compete in regional, state, national and international fairs. In fact, I’m writing to you right now from...

May the 4th be with you – happy Star Wars day! And happy Science Wednesday as well! In Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back, the icy planet of Hoth hosts a temporary Rebel base where the heroes have to defeat Imperial walkers in order to escape. How could...

Here is another video I compiled for the North Central Climate Adaptation Science Center: this one focused on wildfire.   On December 30, 2021, the unthinkable happened. Peaceful suburbs of Denver, Colorado, looking forward to celebrating the start of a New Year,...

Climate change has always happened on Earth, which is clearly seen in the geological record. For the last three weeks, we’ve covered natural climate change: from orbital parameters to the Sun to volcanoes to the oceans and internal variability in the climate system....

This week, we explore the Earth’s oceans and natural ocean-atmosphere interactions. Chapter 3: Natural Climate Change: The Oceans and Internal Variability When the air temperature starts to warm and it’s time to open up the backyard pool and go for a swim, it’s...

Chapter 2: Natural Climate Change: Volcanoes and the Sun So, we’ve established that orbital parameters, like eccentricity of Earth’s orbit and the magnitude of the tilt of the planet are not responsible for the current and rapid climate change that we are seeing. What...

In the lead-up to our “Climate Solutions Days” summit/virtual conference at the North Central Climate Adaptation Science Center during “Earth Week” 2022, Science Wednesdays are going to focus on climate change these next few weeks, starting with natural climate change...

In order to prevent future pandemics, it is important to understand the circumstances that led to past ones. This includes looking at all hypotheses in detail and trying to discern the origin from a complex array of data. Did the COVID-19 outbreak originate at a...

It’s the year 2022. Despite scientific progress in many realms, there’s still a stubborn persistence of pseudoscience, irrational beliefs and even downright science denial. There are many ways we can and do deceive ourselves on a day-to-day basis. When we want...

Over 100 years ago, an incredible story of survival transpired at the bottom of the world. The “Endurance” was a ship used to transport an expedition team, headed by Ernest Shackleton, to cross Antarctica on foot. But, instead, the ship and the crew got trapped in the...

For this Science Wednesday, I'd like to share something we've been working on at the North Central Climate Adaptation Science Center at the University of Colorado. Interested in learning more about climate change impacts? How to communicate science? Then join us...

Around this time last year, Texas experienced an intense and damaging Arctic blast of cold air. Texas, of all places! This week, the “polar vortex” is at it again, bringing snow, ice and incredibly cold temperatures, this time across the central and eastern US. So,...

It’s wintertime in the Northern Hemisphere – and typically that means cold temperatures and snow at the higher latitudes. Beijing, China, the host of the 2022 Winter Olympics, is at roughly the same latitude as Denver, Colorado. It’s cold, but it’s also incredibly...

It’s no surprise that there is worldwide retreat of mountain glaciers in recent decades given rising greenhouse gas emissions and rising temperatures. The concern of losing water from these frozen “storage towers” lies in the fact that ecosystems will suffer,...

What does a particle accelerator, a machine that uses electromagnetic fields to propel charged particles to very high speeds and energies, have to do with imaging the human body? At the European Synchrotron Radiation Facility in Grenoble, France, a particle...

In some exciting news on the space front, the James Webb Space Telescope, which launched on Christmas Day in 2021, has reached its final destination. Webb is the most powerful telescope ever built and is about the size of a tennis court. Over this last month, it had...

On Saturday, January 15th, a powerful undersea volcano erupted near Tonga, an archipelago in the Pacific Ocean, covering the group of islands in a thick layer of ash. A 4-foot wave swept ashore in the Tongan capital, leaving behind flooded homes and structural damage....

Happy New Year 2022 - wishing you all health and happiness! In this Science Wednesday, learn more about Maine's highpoint, Katahdin, and the Appalachian Mountains. Here is a link to the new video. #sciencewednesdays #summitssongsandscience

Come explore the ancient landscape of west Texas, home to Guadalupe Peak, the state highpoint at 8,750 feet! Here is a link to the new video. #sciencewednesdays #summitssongsandscience

Travel with us down to Antarctica and explore the different penguin species during this week's special holiday Science Wednesday! Here is a link to the new video. #sciencewednesdays #summitssongsandscience

Learn more about Mont Blanc and its changing glaciers in this new Science Wednesday. Ricardo and I climbed the peak back in August 2018 - and even got engaged on the summit! Here is the new video... #sciencewednesdays #summitssongsandscience

On June 1, 2019, we hiked Illinois' highpoint, Charles Mound (1,235 ft) for the Summits, Songs and Science project. It's on private property and, due to the owners' wishes, only open the first weekend in June, July, August and September. While in the state, we took...

Check out our new video Science Wednesday. This one explores the volcanic features of northern Arizona. Also featured is Humphreys Peak, Arizona's highpoint at 12,633 feet. While Ricardo climbed it back in 1999, this was Ulyana's 20th state highpoint, climbed on May...

Check out our new video Science Wednesday. This one explores the glaciers of the Wind River Range, home to Wyoming's state highpoint: Gannett Peak, 13,804 ft. #sciencewednesdays #summitssongsandscience

Check out our new video Science Wednesday. This one focuses on The Mammoth Site in Hot Springs, South Dakota, which is home to the largest concentration of mammoth remains in the world. #sciencewednesdays #summitssongsandscience

Check out our new video Science Wednesday. Shot on location on the Vatnajokull icecap (Iceland) in November 2021, this short film explores some of the changes that Europe's largest glacier mass has seen over the decades. #sciencewednesdays #summitssongsandscience

Fagradalsfjall Mountain in the Reykjanes Peninsula, southwestern Iceland, is home to some of the youngest land on the planet. Check out this new video Science Wednesday to learn more about what happened and about different lava types! #sciencewednesdays...

Last week, we shared an educational game you can download and play while learning more about ice flows and changes in Greenland and Antarctica. This week, I wanted to share an opportunity for citizen science using a smartphone app: making cloud observations through...

For those who prefer interacting and experimenting with things on your own, this Science Wednesday is for you! Ice Flows is a new educational computer game based on science (but with some elements of fiction to make the game fun to play) developed at the University of...

In February 2021, the newest Mars rover – Perseverance – touched down at Jezero Crater, interpreted to be the site of an ancient Martian lake. Modern Mars is dry and hostile. But billions of years ago, when the planet still had a magnetic field and thicker atmosphere,...

*Disclaimer: Just like the virus is evolving, so is the science in trying to understand it. Using reputable sources (e.g., scientific research papers, scientific studies, reports from the CDC, Harvard/MIT/Yale Medicine, etc.) versus solely relying on mainstream media...

For the past week, Ricardo and I have been dealing with breakthrough COVID infections. It’s affected us in different ways. While Ricardo lost his sense of smell (anosmia), he’s retained taste. I initially kept smell but lost taste. Now, both senses are gone for me but...

Here in the Northern Hemisphere, leaves on the trees are starting to turn colors. There’s a chill in the air in the mornings and evenings. This Wednesday marks the first day of astronomical fall (autumn) in the Northern Hemisphere. According to the meteorological...

As the world grapples with climate change, let’s talk solutions. What are the long-term ones? The energy sources we currently rely on – oil and gas – are non-renewable, meaning that they draw on finite resources and once those are used up, they’re gone for good....

Warmer conditions in the oceans are raising the potential intensity for storms, where intensity refers to how bad they can get if nothing disrupts them. We have no clearer example of this than Hurricane Ida, a deadly and destructive hurricane that not only impacted...

Colorado is known for its beautiful remote wilderness areas and its high peaks. But it’s also home to one of the largest and most destructive volcanic events in Earth’s history. The story starts roughly 35 million years ago, when layers of lava, ash, and other debris...

Posting Science Wednesday early, due to some upcoming travel and being away from cell signal and the internet. More than 500 miles above the Arctic Circle and at 10,551 ft. (3,216 meters) above sea level, it rained for the first time. On August 14, 2021, temperatures...

50,000 years ago, a large crater was formed in the northern Arizona desert of the United States. To get an idea of the size, imagine twenty American football games being played simultaneously on its floor, while more than 2 million spectators watch from the sloping...

Just a few days ago, the United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) declared a “code red for humanity” in its latest 3,000 page report on the state of the climate. It is clear that the climate is in a state of emergency due to human-caused...

A lot of rain and afternoon thunderstorms are typical of the summer monsoon season here in Colorado. Monsoon? In Colorado? When you hear the word monsoon, you probably think of the heavy rains in India during the summertime. While The North American monsoon is not as...

Here in the Northern Hemisphere during these hot summer days, a lot of us are eating delicious produce like watermelon, peaches and corn-on-the cob. These days, there’s lots of chatter about GMO concerns (genetically modified organisms), but every species that’s ever...

A few days ago, record rainfall caused rivers to burst their banks, leading to devastating floods in parts of western Europe. In the hardest hit parts of Germany, two months’ worth of rain fell in 24 hours, according to Deutscher Wetterdienst, Germany’s meteorological...

Today’s Science Wednesday is a guest post from French anthropologist, Dr. Benjamin Pothier, with a focus on enthobotany. While anthropology is the scientific study of humanity, concerned with human behavior, human biology, cultures and societies, in both the present...

Located along the 40,000-kilometer-long mostly underwater Mid-Atlantic Ridge (MAR) is one of the most volcanically active places in the world: Iceland. The ridge is the meeting point of the Eurasian and North American tectonic plates, and, as the two tectonic plates...

The Pacific Northwest of North America has been experiencing unprecedented heat these last few days. But "unprecedented" doesn’t even do it justice. Statistically speaking, this is shaping up to be a once in a 1000-year occurrence – and that’s in a normal climate. But...

This past weekend, Ricardo and I were in South Dakota. While there, hiking the highpoint (Black Elk Peak – 7,242 ft./2207 m), we were also able to visit nearby Mt. Rushmore – my first time seeing this national memorial. The size of the faces carved into the rock is...