Storm elves and sprites recorded on video

Storm elves and sprites are electric luminous fleeting phenomena that sometimes naturally occur in the upper atmosphere. A team of Spanish researchers managed to make a high speed recording of the phenomena and publish it in the Journal of Geophysical Research. Practically, sprites are electrical discharges shaped like a carrot or a column that form [...]

Saturn’s moon full of geysers

There are many things we have yet to find out about Saturn, but the Cassini probe has definitely shed some light on the planet, and will surely do the same in the following years. The most recent flyby showed a significant number of geysers just waiting to pop out from under the surface – even [...]

Hell’s gate

If a gate to hell existed, I bet this is how it would look like. Locals from the town of Darvaz in Uzbekistan were really inspired when they named it this way. When looking at the pictures, you’d be tempted to think this is some sort of a volcano, but it’s not. Geologists are actually [...]

Melt rises up 25 times faster than previously believed

Scientists have for the first time determined the actual permeability of the asthenosphere in Earth’s upper mantle, which is basically responsible for how fast the melt rises towards the surface of the earth, and the results were surprising to say the least. Researchers found that it actually moves 25 times faster than previously assumed, which [...]

4 hottest volcano events of 2009

Boy 2009 passed quite quickly, but it didn’t go without a blast, that’s for sure ! I’m gonna show you some really amazing stuff that happened during 2009, most of which you probably have no idea of, and this is the first one from that series. 4th place (honorable mention): Mayon, Philippines It may have [...]

Mineral Kingdom Co-evolved With Life

Evolution isn’t just for living organisms, as scientists the Carnegie Institution found. They found that more than 3000 of the 4000+ minerals that exist can be linked more or less directly to biological life. This finding could have a crucial importance for scientists that are searching for life on other planets. Robert Hazen and Dominic [...]