geology

• Environment

Snowman-shaped object on edge of solar system may explain how planets formed, finds Hopkins' New Horizons mission

Ultima Thule, the distant object NASA's New Horizons spacecraft explored on New Year's Day, is actually a pair of spheres that have been fused together by gravity, scientists revealed Wednesday. The Johns Hopkins-led mission could already be helping to confirm theories about how the planets formed.

By Scott Dance

Jan 2, 2019

• News

End of an era: 50-year-old whooping crane breeding program coming to a close at Maryland's Patuxent refuge

The era of the whooping crane at the Patuxent Wildlife Research Center in Laurel is ending. The Trump administration cut the 50-year-old crane breeding program's $1.5 million budget, and by the end of the year, the birds' squawks will no longer be heard at the Patuxent Research Refuge.

By Scott Dance

Oct 12, 2018

• Weather

Some Baltimore blocks could be 15 degrees hotter than others. Mapping them could help address heat hazards.

Researchers are creating a map of the pockets of Baltimore where an abundance of blacktop and a lack of tree cover create what are known as urban heat islands. The data will help address rising public health concerns about heat-related illnesses.

By Scott Dance

Aug 30, 2018

• News

Scientists say Conowingo dam no longer stopping pollution; Hogan seeks solutions

Gov. Larry Hogan next month will seek a contractor to deal with sediment piled up behind the Conowingo dam, and his administration plans to deploy all the leverage it has to limit the pollution spilling into the Cheasapeake Bay.

By Erin Cox

Jul 16, 2017

• Opinion

Don't renovate Lansdowne, replace it

Closer look at the facts suggests Lansdowne High should be replaced, not rebuilt

• Baltimore City

Geologists work to form rock solid foundation for youth interest in science

Geologist Beth Sylvia sat on her knees stacking multiple sieves that looked like round cake pans with mesh bottoms. She then poured a sample of sand from Ocean City over the top one.

By Jessica Anderson

Oct 31, 2015

• News

Chesapeake waters are warming, study finds, posing challenges to healing bay

The Chesapeake Bay's waters are warming, in some places rising more rapidly even than the region's air temperatures, a new University of Maryland study finds. If unchecked, scientists say, the trend could complicate costly, long-running efforts to restore the ailing estuary, worsening fish-suffocating dead zones over time and even altering the food web on which the bay's fish and crabs depend.

By Timothy B. Wheeler

Oct 14, 2015

• Health

Md. geologists to boost seismic monitoring ahead of 'fracking'

The Maryland Geological Survey plans to install a seismometer in Western Maryland next year, anticipating the chance of earthquakes linked to 'fracking.'

By Scott Dance

Aug 19, 2015

• Weather

Geologists explain why Saturday's earthquake packed a punch, but its origin is a mystery

The earthquake that rattled Millersville and Crownsville in Anne Arundel County late Saturday occurred in bedrock nearly 7 miles down and its light shaking likely spread farther than it would have elsewhere because it traveled upward and outward through Maryland's sandy coastal plain.

By Scott Dance

Aug 10, 2015

• Environment

Amid concerns for their health, bees find a powerful buffet in an unlikely urban oasis

Amid concerns for the health of the nation's bees, a federal scientist and self-taught local naturalist team up to find a bee bonanza in an unlikely place – beneath power lines in a gritty bit of Baltimore.

By Timothy B. Wheeler

Jul 19, 2015

• Health

New Horizons releases images of Pluto's surface, moon

The New Horizons spacecraft's first close-ups of Pluto show 11,000-foot mountains of water ice, a relatively thin crust of methane and nitrogen ice, and an unexpected lack of craters, evidence that the planet has more internal geological activity than scientists predicted.

By Scott Dance

Jul 15, 2015

• Health

Hopkins scientists readying for flurry of data as New Horizons nears Pluto

As NASA's New Horizons mission nears an encounter with Pluto, scientists are getting one never-before-seen look of the dwarf planet after another.

By Scott Dance

Jul 3, 2015

• News

Chesapeake Bay streams warming, study finds

Most streams in the Chesapeake Bay region are warming, an air-driven increase that could have significant impacts on the ailing estuary, a new study says.

By Timothy B. Wheeler

Dec 8, 2014

• Health

UM researchers using sound to peer beneath Earth's crust

A University of Maryland, College Park, researcher is using EarthScope, a network of seismometers, to create images of mysterious formations beneath the Earth's crust.

By Scott Dance

Nov 7, 2014

• Howard County

NASA comes to Howard Community College for forum on climate change data

Scientists who observe Earth from space say the data they collect tells them climate change is impacting land use. With a goal of sharing that data with the masses, "Changing Landscapes Observed from Space" is the topic of a forum open to the public at Howard Community College on Nov. 8.

• Health

NASA Messenger mission captures photos of polar ice on Mercury

A spacecraft circling Mercury has captured the first photos of ice deep inside polar craters on Mercury, strengthening confirmation that such pockets exist and helping to further explain how they have evolved.

By Scott Dance

Oct 15, 2014

• Sun Investigates

Phosphorus reduction in bay losing steam in places

Despite early progress reducing Chesapeake Bay pollution, levels of a key pollutant, phosphorus, have not come down in many rivers in the past decade — and are actually worsening in several, officials say.

• Sun Investigates

Phosphorus reduction in bay losing steam in places

• Weather

El Nino odds growing, but impact is murky in Maryland

• Obituaries

Lawrence A. Hardie, Hopkins geology professor

Lawrence Alexander Hardie, a retired Johns Hopkins University geology professor who successfully challenged an assumption about ocean salinity, died of Alzheimer's disease complications Dec. 17 at the Community Hospital of the Monterey Peninsula in California. The former Pasadena and Forest Park resident was 80.

• Environment

Cruise mapping wind prospects off Maryland

The crew of the Scarlett Isabella has been working almost nonstop since late June to map a 94-nautical-square-mile expanse of sea floor off Maryland's coast, gathering data that could help in placing up to 40 huge wind turbines there to generate power.

• Geology

15 million-year-old whale skull found on banks of Potomac River

• Laurel Leader

Smithsonian intern Kelsey Wood is lost in the stars [North Laurel/Savage]

• Environment

Alarming declines seen in frogs, salamanders

• Baltimore City Paper

A disappearing island shows what rising sea levels mean for the Chesapeake Bay

• Science

Bright Minds: Debra Buczkowski, planetary science

• Environment

Fish abnormalities found in three rivers

• Health

New Western Md. map could mark turn in geology research

The Maryland Geological Survey is publishing a new map of Western Maryland that could guide potential shale exploration there and be a first step in redrawing a statewide map.

• Opinion

Maybe give sanity a try

• Nutrition Research

Conowingo Dam sediment buildup threatens Chesapeake Bay

• Environment

Study finds sea level rise accelerating along Atlantic coast

• Earthquakes

How big was Tuesday's quake?

• Maryland

Geologists could be studying reasons behind earthquake for years

Scientists explain differences between East and West Coast quakes

• Geology

Geologists could be studying reasons behind earthquake for years

• Obituaries

John M. Wilson, geologist, dies

John Mackenzie Wilson, who mapped the Eastern Shore for the Maryland Geological Survey, died of a lung disease, idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis, July 3 at the University of Maryland Medical Center. The Fells Point resident was 57.

• Geology

Horseshoe crabs on uptick in MD - for now

• Earthquakes

Earthquakes in Mid-Atlantic states are not infrequent seismic occurrences

• Geology

Shoring up cliffs called harmful to bay

• Geology

Study finds white roofs may cool cities

• Animal Research

Very cool Maryland dinosaur talk tonight

• Climate Change

Drought, melting arctic ice: Abrupt climate change on way?

• Climate Change

Drought, melting arctic ice: Abrupt climate change on way?

• Environmental Science

Drilling, again, for gas in Garrett

• Climate Change

Climate report forecasts smaller, hotter Maryland

• Environmental Science

The Coming BLACK PLAGUE?

• Space

'Duck!' won't save the day

• Geology

Crater study surprise

• Geology

VOLCANIC VOYAGE

• Geology

Get involved in the weather

• Geology

Paving the Bay