Jonathan Ajo-Franklin, a leading mind in applied geophysics and Trustee Professor of Earth, Environmental and Planetary Sciences at Rice University, has been awarded the 2025 Reginald Fessenden Award by the Society of Exploration Geophysicists. The honor recognizes a “specific technical contribution to exploration geophysics” that represents a major scientific or conceptual advancement — a distinction that places Ajo-Franklin among the most influential innovators in the field.

Freshwater under the Ocean – in the 1960's scientists were quite surprised when they looked at their data: it clearly showed that there was fresh or freshened water under the ocean floor. How did it get there? How long has it been there? Scientists have been trying to find answers to these questions since their intriguing discovery. The findings will be relevant for the hydrogeology of the New England Shelf and for multiple similar settings elsewhere around the world. Starting in May, an international team of scientists has embarked on an expedition to take a closer look at, and take samples, of this freshened water stored beneath the ocean floor. Prof Karen Johannesson of University of Massachusetts Boston and Prof Brandon Dugan of Colorado School of Mines are the Co-Chief Scientists of this international expedition. Samples will be collected using the Liftboat Robert, which departed from the port of Bridgeport on May 19.

New international research from Tulane University and published in Nature Geoscience is the first study to demonstrate global-scale patterns in how El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) influences mangrove growth and degradation. Previously, impacts had only been documented at individual sites, such as a dramatic die-off in northern Australia in 2015 when more than 40 million mangrove trees perished along a 1,200-mile stretch of coastline. 

A group of fossils of elasmosaurs – some of the most famous in North America – have just been formally identified as belonging to a “very odd” new genus of the sea monster, unlike any previously known.

Scientists have analyzed ancient DNA and compared more than 400 fossils from 17 natural history museums to figure out how and why extinct sloths got so big.