This winter produced record snowfall in California, but a new study suggests the state should expect gradually declining snowpacks, even if punctuated with occasional epic snowfalls, in the future. An analysis by Tamara Shulgina, Alexander Gershunov, and other climate scientists at UC San Diego’s Scripps Institution of Oceanography suggest that in the face of unabated […]
Scripps Institution of Oceanograpy
Posted inSci/Tech
SalpPOOP Study Highlights Biogeochemical Importance of Zooplankton Fecal Pellets
February 2, 2023 – Microscopic plants called phytoplankton have gained scientific fame for their key role in transferring carbon from the atmosphere to the ocean, but they now may need to share their spotlight with salps, the jelly-like organisms that feed on them. The ocean is a major reservoir of carbon, absorbing large quantities of […]
Posted inCalifornia
Climate Change Projected to Increase Atmospheric River Flood Damages in the Western United States
A research team at Scripps Institution of Oceanography at UC San Diego has found that flood damages triggered by atmospheric river storms may triple from $1 billion a year to over $3 billion a year by the end of the century unless action is taken to reduce global greenhouse gas emissions. The damages could be […]
Posted inCalifornia
Perspectives on California’s Drought and the Relation to Atmospheric Rivers
California’s variable hydroclimate is highly dependent on atmospheric river (AR) storms that transport high concentrations of moisture via long and narrow corridors from the subtropical Pacific to the western United States. A lack or surplus of these storms each year will typically determine whether California experiences a wet or dry water year (begins October 1st […]
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Scientists Announce Comprehensive Regional Diagnostic of Microbial Ocean Life using DNA Testing
Scientists at Scripps Institution of Oceanography at UC San Diego, the J. Craig Venter Institute (JCVI), and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) used tools of genetics research akin to those used in genealogical research to evaluate the diversity of marine life off the California coast. The result is a breakthrough technique that researchers […]
Posted inRegional
Climate Change Identified as Contributor to 2017 Oroville Dam Spillway Incident
A one-two punch of precipitation resulted in damage to Oroville Dam’s main and emergency spillways pushing the second largest dam in California into a crisis in February 2017. Researchers from Scripps Institution of Oceanography at UC San Diego and colleagues say in a new study that they have identified the fingerprint of climate change in the events […]
Posted inEnviro
Climate Change is Making One of the World’s Strongest Currents Flow Faster
The Antarctic Circumpolar Current (ACC), the only ocean current that circumnavigates the planet, is speeding up. For the first time, scientists are able to tell that this is happening by taking advantage of a decades-long set of observational records. Researchers from Scripps Institution of Oceanography at UC San Diego, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, the Chinese […]
Posted inCalifornia
Scripps Oceanography Completes Seafloor Survey Using Robotics, Finds Thousands of Possible Targets of Interest at Dumpsite off Coast of Los Angeles
An expedition led by UC San Diego’s Scripps Institution of Oceanography mapped more than 36,000 acres of seafloor between Santa Catalina Island and the Los Angeles coast in a region previously found to contain high levels of the toxic chemical DDT in sediments and the ecosystem. The survey on Research Vessel (R/V) Sally Ride identified an excess […]
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New Study Identifies Mountain Snowpack Most “At-Risk” from Climate Change
March 1, 2021 – As the planet warms, scientists expect that mountain snowpack should melt progressively earlier in the year. However, observations in the U.S. show that as temperatures have risen, snowpack melt is relatively unaffected in some regions while others can experience snowpack melt a month earlier in the year. This discrepancy in the […]
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Researchers Identify Natural Products with Potential Efficacy Against Coronavirus, Ebola, and Other Lethal Viruses
January 5, 2021 – Researchers at Scripps Institution of Oceanography and Skaggs School of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences at the University of California San Diego have broken down the genomic and life history traits of three classes of viruses that have caused endemic and global pandemics in the past and identify natural products – compounds […]
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New Study Helps Pinpoint When Earth’s Plate Subduction Began
December 10, 2020 -A new study from scientists at Scripps Institution of Oceanography at UC San Diego and the University of Chicago sheds light on a hotly contested debate in Earth sciences: when did plate subduction begin? According to findings published Dec. 9 in the journal Science Advances, this process could have started 3.75 billion years […]
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Is Arctic Warming Behind a Monster Saharan Dust Storm?
December 1, 2020 – The Sahara Desert is the world’s biggest source of dust and in 2020, it broke the June record for sending the largest and thickest dust cloud toward the Americas. Amato Evan, an atmospheric scientist at Scripps Institution of Oceanography at UC San Diego, and colleagues have broken down the conditions that […]
Posted inRegional
Researchers Identify Factor Behind 2017 Oroville Dam Spillways Incident
July 24, 2020 – In a February 2017 incident, failures in the spillways of Oroville Dam forced the evacuation of 188,000 people and caused $1 billion in damage repairs. According to scientists, a warmer climate might create more dangerous events like this. Researchers at Scripps Institution of Oceanography at the University of California San Diego […]
Posted inCalifornia
Study: Atmospheric Rivers to Become Even More Dominant Source of Water Resources and Flooding
July 11, 2019 – A new study led by Scripps Institution of Oceanography at UC San Diego suggests that a new regime of wet and dry extremes is emerging in California and that the projected bolstering of extreme precipitation is likely to be caused by streams of moisture in the sky known as atmospheric rivers […]
Posted inEnviro
Winters Becoming Shorter in Mountainous Western U.S.
January 2, 2019 – Winters are still coming, but they’re becoming increasingly shorter, say the findings of one researcher at Scripps Institution of Oceanography at the University of California San Diego. Looking at snowpack data from 1982 through 2017, researcher Amato Evan found that winters are becoming shorter in mountainous regions. While he found no […]