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Earth science

Signs of instability

The finding that pools of gas hydrates — compounds that trap natural gas emissions — in ocean sediments are deeper than expected implies that the hydrates are destabilizing, and might release gigatonnes of methane. See Letter p.527

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Figure 1: Bubbling up.

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Correspondence to Juergen Mienert.

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Mienert, J. Signs of instability. Nature 490, 491–492 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1038/490491a

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