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the University of New Hampshire Institute for the Study of Earth, Oceans, and Space electronic newsletter.

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Spring 2013
In this Issue of Spheres

Making the Invisible Visible

Mirror Mirror

Building Shelter From
the Storm

A Matter of Scale

IBEX: The Little Satellite
That Could, and Does

The Yin and Yang
of Coastal Carbon

News and Notes
Faculty, Staff, and Student News
From the Director


Institute for the Study of Earth,
Oceans, and Space
(EOS)
EOS Director: Harlan Spence
Editor: David Sims
Designer: Kristi Donahue
Circulation: Laurie Pinciak

Morse Hall, 8 College Road,
Durham, NH 03824
www.eos.unh.edu
eos.director@unh.edu


   

Spring 2013

Changing With the Times
Climate Change Research at EOS
ecosystem and society
In this issue of
Spheres, we focus on some specific aspects of current climate change research being done by scientists within the Earth Systems Research Center. The sampling is by no means exhaustive or all-inclusive. Rather, it uses the common thread of the National Science Foundation/NH Experimental Program to Stimulate Competitive Research (EPSCoR) program's "Ecosystems and Society" project to tie them loosely together. That project, being conducted in collaboration with colleagues across campus and around the state, well represents the trend of linking empirical science to relevant societal needs—a trend increasingly emphasized by national funding agencies and one that EOS researchers have been, and continue to be, deeply invested in.

Cuyahoga fire
Making the Invisible Visible

WHEN NORTHERN OHIO's Cuyahoga River caught fire back in 1952, the depth of American environmental degradation was made manifest. The startling image helped spawn the environmental movement and the eventual passage of laws that cleaned up the nation's water and air. Read More…

albedo
Mirror Mirror

THINK OF the Great Frozen North as a gigantic white t-shirt draped across the top of the world. Just as that attire would help you chill out under a hot summer sun, the massive "permanent" ice and snow of the Arctic region helps cool Earth's overall temperature by reflecting sunlight back out into space. Read More…

Paul Kirshen
Building Shelter From the Storm

AMONG OTHER THINGS blown away by Hurricane Sandy in October 2012 was the notion that climate change was a thing of the future and that humanity had plenty of breathing room before having to gear up against its onslaught. "Sandy really changed the landscape and caused a step increase in climate change adaptation thinking," says research professor Paul Kirshen. Read More…

ecology
A Matter of Scale

BACK IN 2008, when forest ecologist Scott Ollinger happened to pore over six years worth of data he and colleagues had collected on forest sites across North America, he had the rare eureka moment. Read More…


IBEX
Space Science
IBEX: The Little Satellite That Could, and Does

GALACTIC CLOUDS and magnetic ribbons. Such is the ethereal stuff that NASA's Interstellar Boundary Explorer, or IBEX, is out there probing and discovering. The mission has spent four and a half years imaging the edge of our solar system as well as sampling the raw "star stuff" out of which stars, planets, and humans are formed. Read More…


Gulf of Maine
Ocean Science
The Yin and Yang of Coastal Carbon

BACK IN THE SPRING OF 2004, when the Center for Coastal Ocean Observing and Analysis (COOA) began monthly scientific cruises in the Gulf of Maine, the term "ocean acidification" had yet to enter the vernacular of climate change. Read More…


Around the Hall
News and Notes

• Faculty, Staff, and Student News  Read More…
• From the Director: SwRI-EOS Launches  Read more…