degassing

Degassing from Continental Rifts Controls Earth’s Thermostat

As a greenhouse gas, carbon dioxide in the atmosphere has played a major role in regulating Earth’s climate throughout its history. There are vast stores of carbon in the subsurface, but the global carbon cycle controls how much of that carbon enters the atmosphere. As methods for monitoring and tracking the carbon dioxide that moves from the subsurface to the atmosphere improve, scientists have identified continental rift zones, which are the long fissures that form inside plates as they stretch, as important contributors to atmospheric carbon and thus global climate.

Content tagged with “degassing”Showing 1-10 of 48 results

Spreading Faults Create New Deep Carbon Leaks 26 November 2018 Feature

Since at least the 1970s, scientists have noticed that areas with frequent earthquakes also tend to…

Field Report: Investigating the Origins of Carbon Degassing in Romania 22 October 2018 Feature

On 3 September 2018, seven researchers from four countries set off from Cluj-Napoca, Romania for a…

Different Volcano Types Show Their Metal 3 September 2018 Feature

Living organisms have a complex relationship with metals. In small amounts, some metals are vital…

Did a Burst of Halogens Kick Off the End-Permian Extinction? 27 August 2018 Feature

About 250 million years ago, one of the largest known volcanic events in history flooded the area…

Degassing from Mid-Ocean Ridges Refuses to Follow the Rules of Equilibrium 12 June 2018 Feature

A big part of understanding how much carbon Earth holds beneath its surface relies on measuring how…

VIDEO: A Search for Magmatic Carbon Dioxide Degassing in the Afar Rift 22 February 2018 Feature

The team, led by Raphael Pik and Bernard Marty of the CNRS at the University of Lorraine, France,…

Degassing from Continental Rifts Controls Earth’s Thermostat 29 November 2017 Feature

In a new paper in Nature Geoscience [1], Sascha Brune (GFZ German Research Centre for Geosciences,…

When Continents Tear Apart, Stored Carbon Escapes 27 November 2017 Feature

Scientists are beginning to recognize that continental rifts, where the crust rips apart in the…

A Simple, Affordable Way to Measure Diffuse Carbon Release at Volcanoes 23 October 2017 Feature

DCO members Matteo Lelli and Brunella Raco (both at the Institute of Geosciences and Earth…

Researchers Track Sneaky Carbon Dioxide Flux to Estimate Eastern Rift Emissions 18 October 2017 Feature

In a new paper in Geochemistry, Geophysics, Geosystems [1], Jonathan Hunt (University of Oxford, UK…