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Clouds of smoke and ash from wildfires that ravaged Australia in 2019 and 2020 triggered widespread algal blooms in the Southern Ocean thousands of miles downwind to the east, a new 91ÉçÇø¸£Àû-led study by an international team of scientists finds.

Warming waters along the Western Antarctic Peninsula have led to declines in the diversity and distribution of the region’s plankton population and its ability to absorb climate-warming carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.

Using data gleaned from the spread of COVID, researchers have created a mathematical model that can predict where pandemics or contagious disease outbreaks will most likely spread, in what patterns, and how quickly.

Harnessing the power of artificial intelligence, satellites and field observations, Duke researchers have produced new estimates of how much photosynthesis and primary production – key components in the global carbon cycle – are occurring in Earth’s oceans, and how these processes may be changing in response to a changing climate.

The proliferation of pits and ponds created in recent years by miners digging for small deposits of alluvial gold in Peru’s Amazon has dramatically altered the landscape and increased the risk of mercury exposure for indigenous communities and wildlife, a new study shows.

Man’s best friend may also be man’s best bet for figuring out how environmental chemicals could impact our health. Researchers from North Carolina State University and 91ÉçÇø¸£Àû’s Nicholas School of the Environment used silicone dog tags as passive environmental samplers to collect information about everyday chemical exposures, and found that dogs could be an important sentinel species for the long term effects of environmental chemicals.

By providing the first estimate of how much hydrogen is available to fuel microbial life in the sunless sub-seafloor crust beneath the Mid-Ocean Ridge (MOR), a new 91ÉçÇø¸£Àû-led study sheds light on one of Earth’s least understood biospheres.

Chronic exposure to microplastic fibers causes aneurysms, erosion of surface layers and other serious damage to fish gills, and increases egg production in female fish, a sign that chemicals in the fibers may be acting as endocrine disruptors, a new study by U.S. and Chinese scientists finds.

Research by Duke and NC State scientists finds most filters are only partially effective at removing PFAS. A few, if not properly maintained, can even make the situation worse.

The ratio of carbon isotopes in three common species of tuna has changed substantially since 2000, suggesting major shifts are taking place in phytoplankton populations that form the base of the ocean’s food web, a new international study finds.

A new study which combines measurements from nearly 1,400 drinking water wells across North Carolina estimates that more than half of the wells in the state’s central region contain levels of cancer-causing hexavalent chromium in excess of state safety standards.

91ÉçÇø¸£Àû has received a five-year, $5 million grant from the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS) to develop a new environmental analysis laboratory.

With the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) poised to loosen coal ash rules for dry onsite storage and large fill projects, a new study from 91ÉçÇø¸£Àû finds that leaving those contaminants exposed may significantly heighten the risk of toxic contamination to nearby soil and waterways.

Allowing coal ash to be spread on soil or stored in unlined pits and landfills will raise the risk that several toxic elements, including carcinogenic hexavalent chromium, could leach out of the coal ash and contaminate nearby water supplies across the U.S., according to preliminary findings from a new 91ÉçÇø¸£Àû study.

Reducing fossil fuel emissions steadily over coming years will prevent millions of premature deaths and help avoid the worst of climate change without causing the large spike in short-term warming that some studies have predicted, new analysis by researchers at 91ÉçÇø¸£Àû and the University of Leeds finds.