News by Subject Atmospheric Science

A new study led by a University of Maryland biologist discovered two unexpected drivers for migration timing that dispute long-held assumptions and provide insight into potential future effects of climate change on caribou. First, the start of migration is synchronized across North America and tied to large-scale, ocean-driven climate cycles. Second, warm, windless summers that favored insect pests lead to poorer maternal health and delayed arrivals at the calving grounds the following spring.

Much about the aerodynamic effects of larger wind farms remains poorly understood. New work in this week's Journal of Renewable and Sustainably Energy looks to provide more insight in how the structures necessary for wind farms affect air flow. Using a two-scale coupled momentum balance method, researchers theoretically and computationally reconstructed conditions that large wind farms might face in the future, including the dampening effect that comes with spacing turbines close to one another.

A team of scientists from Tyumen State University together with their foreign colleagues discovered that soil mites change their dietary preferences if their habitat is transformed by human activity. The study helped better understand the effect of environmental changes on living beings.

The Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) Flexible Global Ocean-Atmosphere-Land System (FGOALS-f3-L) model datasets prepared for the sixth phase of the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project (CMIP6) Global Monsoons Model Intercomparison Project (GMMIP) provide a valuable tool to assess sea surface temperature trends and its influence on monsoon circulation and precipitation patterns, while also providing a clearer understanding of how topography can affect the global monsoon system as it passes over landscapes with high altitudes.

Despite being a protected high conservation value habitat, the Atlantic coastal dunes are severely impacted by invasive species. In the Belgian coastal dunes, Oregon grape is one of the worst invaders, so Belgian scientists conducted an experiment to provide recommendations for all affected countries. By publishing their discovery in the open-access journal NeoBiota, the research team aims to boost international collaboration on the development of methods for invasive species control in conservation habitats.