Reviews & Analysis

Atmospheric levels of chloroform, an ozone-depleting substance not part of the Montreal Protocol, have risen. The increase may be attributable to industrial emissions in Eastern China.

Mangrove canopy heights vary around the world in response to rain, storms and human activities, suggests a global analysis of mangrove canopy height. How tall the trees are matters for estimating global mangrove carbon storage.

Seismic data during the time interval between larger earthquakes could contain information about fault displacements and potential for future failure, suggest analyses of data from laboratory and real-world slow-slip earthquakes using machine-learning techniques.

Stressors such as large-scale damming, hydrological change, pollution, the introduction of non-native species and sediment mining are challenging the integrity and future of large rivers, according to a synthesis of the literature on the 32 biggest rivers.

Most of the net water transferred over the past 15 years from non-glaciated land to the oceans has originated from landlocked basins, according to satellite data. This source of sea-level rise is often overlooked.

Extreme temperature swings and deteriorating environments are perhaps what killed most life in the end-Permian extinction, suggest climate model simulations. Siberian Traps volcanism probably triggered the events.

Changes in calcification of marine organisms must be considered to explain the deepening of carbonate accumulation during ocean recovery from acidification events. According to a literature synthesis and modelling, dissolution of sedimentary carbonate is not sufficient to explain observations.

During flat subduction, material is scraped off the base of the continental mantle lithosphere, building a migrating keel. This testable mechanism for flat subduction recreates features of the Laramide orogeny.

Understanding the thermodynamics of air-mass transformations that occur in the atmosphere at the boundary between the Arctic and mid-latitudes is key to improving weather and climate predictions, according to a literature synthesis

Groundwater-derived CO₂ inputs and emissions along streams are highly variable in both space and time, according to measurements of dissolved CO₂ from two headwater catchments.

Ice buried deep within the ice sheet on Antarctica preserves clues to past climatic change dating back more than a million years. A recent workshop discussed the challenges — and hopes — of drilling to these buried treasures.

Species richness in mountain environments is linked to mountain-building and climatic processes, an integration of geological, climatic, and biological datasets reveals.

While anthropogenic influence on global climate is clear, human impact on the Southern Ocean has been difficult to pin down. A new detection and attribution study achieves just that.

The abundance of microorganisms in the continental subsurface may have been overestimated, according to a review compilation of data from subsurface localities around the globe.

The Laurentide Ice Sheet sapped the strength of the North American monsoon during the last ice age, but the ice sheet’s grip on the monsoon weakened as it retreated northwards.

Droughts lead to enhanced water-use efficiency and reduced carbon uptake by plants. Global analyses of atmospheric CO₂ monitoring data suggest that the scale of the trade-off between water and carbon extends to a biome level.

Robust evidence for a previously proposed sea-level fall and rise during the Last Interglacial is lacking, according to a synthesis. This calls estimates of high rates of sea-level rise at the end of the Last Interglacial into question.