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  • As climate change accelerates, fire regimes are increasingly disrupting ecosystems and carbon storage. A modelling study reveals that fire is already acting to substantially weaken global carbon sinks, potentially undermining efforts to limit warming.

    • Jiafu Mao
    News & Views
  • Only about 1.07 °C of climate warming above the pre-industrial level is required for fire to substantially diminish the effectiveness of global carbon sinks, suggesting that climate change has already been weakening carbon storage through fire, according to integrated model simulations that consider the interaction between fire and vegetation.

    • Chantelle A. Burton
    • Douglas I. Kelley
    • Liana O. Anderson
    ArticleOpen Access
  • Modelling of the evolution of the Kosi drainage basin near Chomolungma suggests that a river capture event occurred approximately 89 ka ago. Isostatic rebound due to this capture event could contribute 10–50% of the total rock uplift rate in the Chomolungma region and might partly explain Chomolungma’s renewed uplift rate and anomalous elevation.

    Research Briefing
  • The recent uptick in surface uplift of Chomolungma (Mount Everest) can be partly attributed to isostatic rebound due to increased erosion following a river capture event, according to river evolution and flexural modelling.

    • Xu Han
    • Jin-Gen Dai
    • Matthew Fox
    Article
  • A seismic tomographic model shows that the directional dependence of the travel time of seismic waves through Earth’s inner core can be explained by a spatially varying orientation of the transverse isotropy symmetry axis, which is simpler than other proposed structures.

    • Hen Brett
    • Jeroen Tromp
    • Arwen Deuss
    Article
  • Multidecadal declines in methanesulfonic acid in arctic ice cores reflect increasing anthropogenic pollution in the industrial era rather than declining marine primary production, according to analyses of a multi-century record of methanesulfonic acid from Alaska and atmospheric modelling.

    • Jacob I. Chalif
    • Ursula A. Jongebloed
    • Jihong Cole-Dai
    Article
  • An investigation of global trace-element data suggests that the parental melts of hotspot lavas are uniform in their elemental composition, consistent with derivation from a common depleted and outgassed mantle reservoir.

    • Matthijs A. Smit
    • Ellen Kooijman
    ArticleOpen Access
  • Clinopyroxene offers clues about the inner workings of volcanic systems, as Teresa Ubide explains. Its ability to track where and when magma is stored may also help forecast eruptions.

    • Teresa Ubide
    All Minerals Considered
  • Sand is an overlooked resource and is being depleted at an alarming rate. Improved management of sand extraction and consumption is imperative to protect sand resources and reduce the impacts of extraction.

    Editorial