The International Mineralogical Association has named a new mineral, the first to be discovered in a particle from a comet, in honor of Donald Brownlee, a UW astronomer who revolutionized research on interplanetary dust entering Earth’s atmosphere.
Author: Vince Stricherz
I spent more than 20 years as a reporter and editor in broadcast, print and wire service news, and have been covering physical sciences at UW for more than a decade. I currently cover Earth and space sciences, chemistry and physics, and also handle some editing duties for UW Today and the Faculty & Staff Insider Web pages.
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For the first time paleontologists have found fossilized burrows of tetrapods — any land vertebrates with four legs or leglike appendages — in Antarctica dating from the Early Triassic epoch, about 245 million years ago.
Biofuels based on ethanol, vegetable oil and other renewable sources are increasingly popular with government and environmentalists as a way to reduce fossil fuel dependence and limit greenhouse gas emissions.
Biofuels based on renewable sources are increasingly popular as a way to reduce fossil fuel dependence and limit greenhouse gas emissions, but new research shows that some of the most popular current biofuel stocks might have exactly the opposite impacts than intended.
When the world’s most powerful subatomic particle collider begins gathering data this summer, it will be a major milestone for a number of UW scientists.
University of Washington scientists played a central role in building part of the Atlas detector, part of the Large Hadron Collider in Switzerland, which goes online this summer and is hoped will resolve some long-standing physics problems.
Polar bears fighting for survival in the face of a rapid decline of polar ice have made the Arctic a poster child for the negative effects of climate change.
Polar bears fighting for survival in the face of a rapid decline of polar ice have made the Arctic a poster child for the negative effects of climate change.
Rain falling on snow sounds like a relatively harmless weather event, but when it happens in the far north it can mean lingering death for reindeer, musk oxen and other animals that normally graze on the Arctic tundra.
Rain falling on snow sounds like a relatively harmless weather event, but when it happens in the far north it can mean lingering death for reindeer, musk oxen and other animals that normally graze on the Arctic tundra.
Nature is full of examples of creatures that try to look as big as possible in an effort to scare away potential predators.
While the annual Sound Shake exercise on Wednesday produced a simulated magnitude 6.
While the annual Sound Shake exercise on Wednesday produced a simulated magnitude 6.
People in at least four states and a Canadian province saw a bright fireball streaking across the Pacific Northwest sky in the early hours Tuesday but, contrary to some reports, there was no collision with the ground, University of Washington scientists said.
Melting glaciers in Greenland and Antarctica, combined with other effects of global climate change, are likely to raise sea levels in parts of Western Washington by the end of this century, though geological forces will offset the rising water in some areas.
It has been a decade since University of Washington scientists first pinpointed specific instances of air pollution, including Gobi Desert dust, traversing the Pacific Ocean and adding to the mix of atmospheric pollution already present along the West Coast of North America.
It has been 35 years since humans last walked on the moon, but there has been much recent discussion about returning, either for exploration or to stage a mission to Mars.
Earth tremors not linked to volcanic activity first turned up in seismic observations several years ago, but those tremors were almost exclusively in subduction zones such as the Cascadia region off the coast of the Pacific Northwest.
For more than a decade geoscientists have detected what amount to ultra-slow-motion earthquakes under Western Washington and British Columbia on a regular basis, about every 14 months.
Earth tremors not linked to volcanic activity first turned up in seismic observations several years ago, but those tremors were almost exclusively in subduction zones such as the Cascadia region off the coast of the Pacific Northwest.
For more than a decade geoscientists have detected what amount to ultra-slow-motion earthquakes under Western Washington and British Columbia on a regular basis, about every 14 months.
Despite decades of ever more-exacting science projecting Earth’s warming climate, there remains large uncertainty about just how much warming will actually occur.
Despite decades of ever more-exacting science projecting Earth’s warming climate, there remains large uncertainty about just how much warming will actually occur.
When Steve Malone retired earlier this month, he could take satisfaction in the great strides that have been made in forecasting volcanic eruptions, particularly in the Pacific Northwest.
Undergraduate astronomy students at the UW combing through images from a specialized telescope have discovered more than 1,300 asteroids that had never before been observed.
Undergraduate astronomy students at the University of Washington combing through images from a specialized telescope have discovered more than 1,300 asteroids that had never before been observed.
For two generations of physicists, it has been a standard belief that the neutron, an electrically neutral elementary particle and a primary component of an atom, actually carries a positive charge at its center and an offsetting negative charge at its outer edge.
Birds that hang out in large urban areas seem to have a marked advantage over their rural cousins — they are adaptable enough to survive in a much larger range of conditions.
Birds that hang out in large urban areas seem to have a marked advantage over their rural cousins — they are adaptable enough to survive in a much larger range of conditions.
The National Snow and Ice Data Center in Boulder, Colo.
For two generations of physicists, it has been a standard belief that the neutron, an electrically neutral elementary particle and a primary component of an atom, actually carries a positive charge at its center and an offsetting negative charge at its outer edge.
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A team led by Larry Dalton, a UW chemistry professor, has received an $18 million grant over five years from the National Science Foundation to continue its pioneering work in the field of photonics.
In this era of not surrendering to age, some claim that 60 is the new 40.
Traditional plow-based agricultural methods and the need to feed a rapidly growing world population are combining to deplete the Earth’s soil supply, a new study confirms.
You could understand if a half-dozen Magellanic penguins developed a “big bird is watching” phobia before this month is over, but the surveillance really will be for their own good.
A UW-based chemistry research center, poised to become a leader in science that will lead to new products and processes, has been awarded $3 million a year for five years by the National Science Foundation.
Perhaps it was just a matter of sympathy, but tremors rippled the landscape of Vancouver Island, the westernmost part of British Columbia, in 2002 during a major Alaskan earthquake.