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Inside Biosphere 2: Earth Science Under Glass [Scientists in the Field]
by Mary Kay Carson; photos by Tom Uhlman
Middle School Houghton 80 pp.
10/15 978-0-544-41664-2 $18.99
Carson takes readers into Biosphere 2, the research facility designed to be a self-sustaining model of Earth’s environments. There’s brief coverage of the innovative engineering and original mission of the facility (complete with photos of the first jumpsuit-clad human “biospherians” who were sealed inside from 1991 to 1993), but the focus is primarily on current research under the direction of scientists at the University of Arizona. The ability to control environmental conditions within the contained rainforest, ocean, and giant soil laboratory allows researchers to investigate questions in earth science — prominently, those related to climate change — on a scale not possible in any other laboratory setting. Biogeochemist Joost van Haren has tinkered with the composition of the rainforest’s atmosphere for twenty years, examining the effects of excess carbon dioxide on the contained atmosphere, soil, and biomass. Hydrologist Luke Pangle built a huge artificial slope to study soil production and erosion. Sustainability coordinator Nate Allen researches the facility itself, examining how this “Model City” can reduce its energy footprint. Educational efforts at Biosphere 2 are also profiled, as the ocean biome is repurposed as a teaching and research lab. Plentiful photos of the researchers, facility, and surrounding environment capture the feel of a busy research center and show the nuts and bolts of maintaining controlled conditions. Uhlman’s photographs take us into back rooms and basements to see the wires, computers, pumps, and pipes that keep the place running. A glossary, index, references (including citations to the research papers produced by Biosphere 2 scientists), and places to read about the original project are appended.
At the start of The Earth app (Tinybop, September 2015), our blue planet rotates against a field of stars, with occasional comets flashing by (reminiscent of the opening to Neil deGrasse Tyson’s Cosmos). Scroll along a timeline at top of the screen to move through four geological eras, beginning with the Hadean Eon — the earth’s appearance changes with the era.
You can also move a sliding bar across the earth to see it in cross-section, with labels identifying core, mantle, crust, and other features (tap a key-shaped tab at top left to access a pull-out menu when you can turn the labels on/off, change the language, etc.).
When you get to the Phanerozoic Eon — the current era — tap on Earth to explore the ways geological features are created and eroded. This screen displays two mountain ranges illustrated with a cut-paper look: the left-hand mountain is in a warmer, coastal locale and the right is in a snowy region. Tap anywhere on the screen or touch the magnifying glass in the upper right-hand corner to zoom in on each landmass. You can interact with many of the geological features — causing rain to fall and tectonic plates to shift — but most of the action takes place inside highlighted circles.
Tap the circle near a volcano, for instance, to zoom in on it. Here you can change the height and width of the volcano using icons at the right, and a sliding bar allows you to see the cross-section. Make magma spew up and over the top by tapping repeatedly. What’s particularly cool is that when you exit this zoomed-in screen to get back to the mountain ranges, any changes you made to the volcano remain (mine is now short and fat). It’s even cooler when you accidentally throw a lighthouse into the sea (oops) and then can find it there every time you go back to that area. And there is a hotspot volcano underwater which, when tapped repeatedly, spews lava that then solidifies, making the volcano larger with every eruption. When it gets big enough, it emerges from the water and becomes a volcanic island that’s still there every time you revisit the app. The pull-out menu at the left side of the screen allows you to easily access any of these featured geological events.
It is not always easy to figure out what to do in the app. For example, in the “River Erosion” section, you can tap the bank to make more and bigger rocks fall into the water. However, when the individual rocks are tapped, they become highlighted by a purple circle that doesn’t seem to do anything. And the river bank doesn’t actually appear to erode (even though in other sections — “River Meandering,” for one — the geological forces change the landscape significantly).
There is a handbook in the parent’s dashboard with useful terms and helpful explanations. But while navigating the app itself, more guidance would have been welcome — an optional voiceover explaining different phenomena or indicators hinting what to do in each activity would be incredibly useful. Otherwise, The Earth could certainly be entertaining, attractive, and educational for a patient, science-minded middle-grade user.
All vineyards and thus the wines they produce are not created equal. Two Chardonnays grown in neighbouring plots but with slightly differing soils, slopes and sun exposure will taste subtly different, even if both will still taste of Chardonnay too. This unique ‘somewhereness’ is what the French call terroir.
Throughout history, the influence of the full Moon on humans and animals has featured in folklore and myths. Yet it has become increasingly apparent that many organisms really are influenced indirectly, and in some cases directly, by the lunar cycle. Here are ten things you may not know concerning the way the Moon affects life on Earth.
Earth Day, April 22nd is right around the corner, and we at Lee & Low are some pretty big fans of this blue planet we live on. So, whether you choose to plant a tree or pledge to better uphold the 3 R’s -reduce, reuse, recycle- we are celebrating and promoting awareness the best way we know how- with books!
Here are 5 environmentally friendly collections to bring nature indoors & encourage “thinking green”:
Save the Planet: Environmental Action Earth Day Collection: Be inspired to be an advocate for planet Earth through the true stories of threatened ecosystems, environmental recovery efforts and restorations plans, and heroic actions. Like the individuals and communities explored in these stories, children everywhere will realize the difference they can make in protecting our planet and preserving its natural resources.
Earth Day Poetry Collection: Through rhythm and verse, float down the cool river, reach as high as the tallest tree, and search for all of the vibrant colors of the rainbow in the natural world. This collection of poetry books are inspired by the joy and wonder of being outdoors and brings the sight and sounds of nature and all of its wildlife to life.
Seasonal Poems Earth Day Collection: Travel through winter, spring, summer, & fall through a series of bilingual seasonal poems by renowned poet and educator, Francisco Alarcón. Learn about family, community, and caring for each other and the natural environment we live in.
Adventures Around the World Collection: Explore Africa while traversing Botswana’s lush grasslands and Uganda’s Impenetrable Forest, celebrate the deep-seeded respect for wildlife in India, Mongolia and on an island off the coast of Iceland, and journey to Australia to explore animals found nowhere else on Earth.
Vanishing Cultures Collection: The 7-book series introduces readers to the Yanomama of the Amazon Basin, Aborigines of Australia, Sami of the European Arctic, Inuit of the North American Arctic, Tibetans and Sherpas from the Himalaya, Mongolians of Asia, and Tuareg of the Sahara.
Lesson Plans & Ideas:
What fun is Earth Day if you don’t get your hands a little dirty? Bring some of the outdoors into your classroom-or vice versa- by engaging students in various hands-on and project-based Earth Day lessons and activities:
I Want to Be Recycled from Keep America Beautiful. Find out how different kinds of materials are recycled, transforming trash into new things. Students can play a super sorter game and start a recycling movement in their community.
Veronicahas a degree from Mount Saint Mary College and joined LEE & LOW in the fall of 2014. She has a background in education and holds a New York State childhood education (1-6) and students with disabilities (1-6) certification. When she’s not wandering around New York City, you can find her hiking with her dog Milo in her hometown in the Hudson Valley, NY.
1 Comments on Reading for the Earth: Ultimate Earth Day Resource Roundup, last added: 4/20/2015
Readers might be interested to know that almost every book we manufacture is printed on FSC certified paper, meaning the sources can be traced to ensure it is not old growth product. Those that do not carry the FSC logo are printed on stock that is also certified but exempt from the logo as they contain an element that cannot by sourced – typically, for example, recycled board that the hardcovers are bound with. We also take steps to use wherever possible soy and/or vegetable based inks rather than petroleum.
Please do not think that I have been transferred from Amsco’s science department to the foreign language department. Earth science has a number of Spanish terms in its lexicon: El Niño, La Niña, and now La Nada. Yes, I checked with Florencia, Amsco’s Spanish editor, and “nada” does mean “nothing.” The next question is: What does “nothing” have to do with Earth science?
In December 2010, La Niña was in full swing. The image on the left shows cold water (the blue and purple band) flowing across the Pacific Ocean. Under ordinary circumstances, when La Niña begins to fade, El Niño, which brings warm water, takes its place. However, by April 2011, there was no sign of El Niño, as shown in the image on the right. These images were taken by the Ocean Surface Topography Mission (OSTM)/Jason-2 satellite, NASA JPL.
You may be asking: What has La Nada to do with me? Well, remember all those snow storms and cold weather last January and February? They may have been caused by La Nada. According to NASA climatologist Bill Patzert, “La Niña was strong in December, but back in January it pulled a disappearing act and left us with nothing—La Nada—to constrain the jet stream. Like an unruly teenager, the jet stream took advantage of the newfound freedom—and the results were disastrous.” The jet stream meandered wildly around the United States and the weather pattern became dominated by strong outbreaks of frigid polar air, producing blizzards across the West, Upper Midwest, and Northeast in the United States.
In the spring, there were many strong thunderstorms and tornados. Russell Schneider, Director of the NOAA-NWS Storm Prediction Center, explains: “First, very strong winds out of the south carrying warm, moist air from the Gulf of Mexico met cold jet stream winds racing in from the west. Stacking these two air masses on top of each other created the degree of instability that fuels intense thunderstorms.”
According to Patzert, “The jet stream—on steroids—acted as an atmospheric mix master, causing tornadoes to explode across Dixie and Tornado Alleys, and even into Massachusetts.”
The next time someone asks you: What’s up with the weather? You can say: “It’s nothing,” and smile sweetly.
On October 25, 2006, NASA launched twin STEREO (SolarTErrestrial RElations Observatory) spacecrafts. STEREO began sending back exceptional pictures of the sun and solar storms from the beginning of its mission. On Sunday, February 6, 2011, the two spacecrafts reached their positions 180° apart, aligned exactly opposite each other on either side of the sun. NASA showed the world the first 360° view of the sun.
I’ll admit that I’m a science geek, so I find this exciting. However, why should the average person be excited by this? Before I answer that question, let me ask a few more. Do you depend on GPS technology to get you from place to place? Do you listen to satellite radio or receive your television programming via a dish antenna rather than cable? How long could you go without your cell phone? Is electricity important to your wellbeing? You may feel like asking me what this has got to do with seeing the whole sun.
It has to do with sunspots and solar eruptions. To learn a little about sunspots see Stumbling into Cycle 24. In that post, I mentioned that during 2008, the sun was quiet with very few sunspots because sunspot cycle 23 was ending and cycle 24 was about to begin. Now, it’s 2011; cycle 24 is in gearing up and the number of sunspots and solar eruptions are increasing. So what, you may say. Sunspots and solar eruptions occur over the entire sun. Solar eruptions send streams of charges plasma particles into space. When the eruptions are aimed directly at Earth they can cause geomagnetic storms on Earth. Geomagnetic storms cause
0 Comments on Space Weather: Who Cares? as of 1/1/1900
I am really excited about introducing you to the second edition of Earth Science: The Physical Settingby Thomas McGuire. It has been my pleasure to work with Mr. McGuire to make this edition even better than the original. If you liked the first edition, you will love the second. We have made many changes. The cover, shown above, features a photograph of the Eyjafjallajokull volcano in Iceland.
What’s New in Amsco’s Earth Science: The Physical Setting, Second Edition?
New color photographs specifically illustrate concepts in the text.
The new colorul design features Unit Openers that set the stage for what follows.
The reorganized Table of Contents puts chapters on weathering, erosion, deposition, rivers, groundwater, oceans, coastal processes, and landscapes before chapters on earthquakes, plate tectonics, and geologic hazards.
The 28 chapters of the textbook are now arranged into 8 units: 1. Earth Measures and Models 2. Minerals, Rocks, and Resources 3. Weathering and Erosion 4. Water Shapes Earth’s Surface 5. Earth’s Internal Heat Engine <
0 Comments on Hot Off the Press! Earth Science: The Physical Setting, 2nd Edition as of 1/1/1900
It’s official. Summer is over. Although summer vacation has ended and school has already begun, tonight the Earth will initiate the fall season with the autumnal equinox.
The autumnal equinox will occur at approximately 11:09 p.m. EDT tonight. The word equinox, Latin for “equal night,” means that night and day are going to be almost exactly the same length. Through the tilting of the Earth’s axis that brings seasonal change, the equinox represents when the sun is aligned with the equator, equalizing the sun's rays across the hemispheres. For many other parts of the northern hemisphere (those in earlier time zones), the wee early hours of Thursday morning will officially mark the beginning of fall. On come shorter days and colder weather.
Another treat to celebrate during the change to autumn is tonight's full harvest moon. The harvest moon happens yearly, near the time of the autumn equinox; but this year the two phenomena fall on the same day. What marks the harvest moon is its appearance. Different from other full moons, tonight’s moon will be low in the sky, thus taking on a reddish appearance. It will be full again tomorrow night.
When I think of fall, I am always reminded of the first few weeks of school. As a young kid heading off to walk to middle school, I would crunch the dry dead leaves under my shoes as I skipped the half-mile stretch with my best friend. I remember the sharpening of No. 2 pencils, getting to know new teachers, and dreading my
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I was reading an advertisement for athletic clothing that featured dry-wick fabric. I have heard my son Don, the runner, extol the virtues of dry-wicking tee shirts and shorts. The idea is that these fabrics will keep you cool, dry, and comfortable no matter how hard you exercise. What’s the science behind how they work and what are they made of, I wondered. The answer arrived a few days later in an article from the Washington Post.
According to the article, it all depends on the fibers the fabric is made of. For example, natural fibers, such as cotton, are very good at absorbing moisture. However, they are not very good at letting go of moisture, that is letting the sweat evaporate from the fabric. On the other hand, polyester is not good at absorbing moisture; it will trap heat and moisture on your body. Now nylon, also a synthetic fiber, is pretty good at absorbing moisture and also pretty good at letting go of it, which is why nylon garments dry quickly.
To make dry-wick 100 percent polyester fabric, manufacturers can add a coating to the fibers, adjust the chemistry of the polyester fibers, or change their shape to make them more absorbent. Most polyester fibers are tube-shaped, but giving them a scalloped-oval or four-leaf-clover cross section makes them more absorbent because that creates tiny channels for the sweat to flow through to reach the outside of the fabric. (For you Earth science teachers, it is just like capillary action in soil.) Manufacturers can also mix natural fibers with synthetic fibers so that the fabric is absorbent, wicking the sweat away from your body and releasing the moisture from the surface of the fabric.
Unfortunately, there are no industry-wide standards for rating the moisture-wicking ability of clothes. Athletes, even weekend athletes, will have to figure out what they want from their workout clothes and read the labels. I guess that I don’t have to “sweat it,” because at my age, I rarely exercise that strenuously.
I was vacationing in Maine this summer and had the opportunity to join family members for a day trip up Mount Washington, in neighboring New Hampshire. When told this would involve riding up and down on a cog railroad, I was apprehensive. My son replied, “They have been operating this railroad since 1869.” That statement reassured me, somewhat.
The Station In the end, the main appeal for taking this journey was to experience 19th-century technology. I could rationalize it as a history lesson. We were put off, though, by the posting of the prices at the station: $62 for adults! But we decided to bite the bullet and hand over our credit card.
The Ascent The trip up was truly scary. What would happen if the train, climbing straight up a steep slope, disengaged from its cog rack? We would be racing down backwards at an ever-increasing speed until we crashed. Or what would happen if the train in front of us did that? It would smash into us. The conductor’s talk about a recent (how recent?) landslide did nothing to soothe the nerves.
I tried to look for vistas on the way up but visibility was limited. It was more satisfying to look at the vegetation alongside the track and notice that the types of flowers, other plants, and trees changed as we moved up Mount Washington. Eventually we got so high up that there were no trees, just boulders and small plants. I did not see any mammals or birds up near the top.
2 Comments on Cogging Up Mount Washington, last added: 7/28/2010
I haven’t written one of these essays since I was in grammar school. However, I had several interesting and science-related experiences this summer and I thought I would share them. I drove my son Ed and my mother from Long Island to York, Pennsylvania, to visit my sister. On our way, we crossed Lower New York Bay, the Delaware River, and the Susquehanna River. Once we cross the Susquehanna, we know that we are nearing York. I find it amusing that we travel from New York to York, which claims to be the first capital of the United States.
After a short visit, I left my mom at my sister’s, and Ed and I traveled south along I 83 to Baltimore, Maryland. I 83 runs south through the Appalachian Plateau. At that time, I was working on the chapter in Reviewing Earth Science: The Physical Setting, Third Edition that deals with the landscapes of New York. I mentioned to Ed, as we travelled up and down some really big hills, that according to the New York State Earth Science Reference Tables, we were travelling though a plateau not mountains. He said that he thought that plateaus were flat and we certainly were not going through a flat area. I told him that this area is a dissected plateau, which means it has been cut up by rivers and erosion. The layers of rock in a plateau are horizontal while the layers of rock that make up mountains have been folded and tilted He said, “I like traveling with you because you know so many odd facts.”
By the way, Reviewing Earth Science: The Physical Setting, which will include the 2010 Earth Science Reference Tables and has been updated to include questions based on the new tables, will be available in early October.
When we got to Baltimore, where Ed was attending the Firehouse Convention, I had some time to kill, so I visited the USS Constellation, the last all sail warship built by the US Navy. A nice young man who works for the Inner Harbor in Baltimore saw me taking pictures of the ship and asked if I would like him to take my picture, which you see above.
Later in the afternoon, Ed and I visited the Maryland Science Center. As we walked toward the building, we heard a strange noise; it sounded like a loud roar. Through the windows of the science center, we could see a large dinosaur. Well, Ed knew that would be the first place we visited. There was an exhibit that had a full size replica of an encounter between at T. rex and an Astrodon, a plant eater whose name means “star tooth.” We also had fun visiting the exhibits in Newton’s Alley, which featured physics demonstrations.
I left Ed in Baltimore and went to spend some time with my nephew Eric and his family. I really enjoyed playing with Ryan (three years old) and Caroline (one year old). It was good granny practice for when Theo gets older. We went to visit Dutch Wonderland, a family centered amusement park and had a great time. The little ones were a joy.
So, that is how I spent my long weekend away from NYC: some family activities, some driving, and of course, some science.
0 Comments on How I Spent My Summer Vacation as of 1/1/1900
I have always been fascinated by the aurora. I don’t mean Disney’s Sleeping Beauty. What I mean are the lights that play across the night sky in the Arctic and Antarctic. My mother told me that during the blackouts in World War II, she saw an aurora in Brooklyn, New York. One of the best places to see the aurora borealis, or northern lights, is in Yellowknife, Canada. Over the South Pole these lights are called the aurora australis, or southern lights.
For many years, scientists wondered about what causes the aurora. Recently, astronomers, with the help of five new satellites, found the answer. It all has to do with Earth’s magnetic field and the solar wind.
Earth’s magnetic field is produced by the circulation of molten iron in Earth’s core. The field acts as if there were a giant bar magnet buried deep within Earth. Now, please don’t e-mail me that the diagram here is wrong. I know that the S pole of the imaginary magnet is near the Geographic North Pole. Just think about it. The needle of a compass is a magnet. We call the end of the needle that points roughly toward the Geographic North Pole the north-seeking pole of the compass. As in love and electricity, opposites attract. Therefore, the magnetic pole near the Geographic North Pole must be an S pole. Lines of force emanate from Earth’s magnetic poles. Since the lines of force encircle Earth from the North Pole to the South Pole, this field is called the magnetosphere.
Solar wind is the plasma made of charged particles (protons, electrons, and ions) that leaves the sun in all directions. These particles travel at high speeds—an average of about 400 km/sec. That is almost a million mph. The solar wind varies routinely through the 27-day rotation cycle of the Sun. It also appears sporadically, in response to violent eruptions in the corona. These eruptions can result in geomagnetic storms on Earth.
A geomagnetic storm is a magnetic storm on Earth caused by solar activity. They produce the auroras. However, they can also cause some very undesirable effects, such as electrical current surges in power lines, interference with radio, television, and telephone signals, and problems with defense communications. They even affect compasses anywhere on Earth.
The astronomers learned from ground observations and the five satellites that the solar wind stretches Earth’s magnetic field well into space. When the field snaps back, Earth is showered with solar particles. This sudden release of energy causes the dancing northern lights.
I hope to see the northern lights some day. However, I don’t think it is likely because I really hate the cold.
Today is a special day; it is the Autumnal Equinox. Oh, it’s the day the fall season begins. For most people, it’s the day the sun rises due east and sets due west, and when the length of day and night are about equal. As long as you are not concerned with the finer details, this is pretty much true. If you watched the news this morning, the weather person most likely said that fall begins today at 11:45 a.m. edt. Why is there a precise time, and how do they know that? Fall begins when the center of the sun crosses the celestial equator on its journey from the Northern to the Southern Hemisphere in the sky. The celestial equator is a projection of Earth’s equator into the sky. In addition, on this day the sun’s path lies directly along the Earth’s equator.
While fall begins here in the Northern Hemisphere, spring begins in the Southern Hemisphere. The seasons are reversed in the Southern Hemisphere.
0 Comments on What’s Special About Today? as of 9/22/2008 11:13:00 AM
Nearly everyone has heard of “The Snows of Kilimanjaro,” thanks to Hemingway’s story by that name. Now people are also hearing about the shrinking glaciers of Kilimanjaro. This tallest mountain in Africa (on the border of Kenya and Tanzania) seems to be falling victim to a recent global trend of disappearing mountaintop glaciers. This trend is being blamed on global warming — a claim yet to be proved.
Why care? Well, Mount Kilimanjaro is special to me because I had the great pleasure of climbing this behemoth a few decades ago. And today, August 4, is special to me because it is the anniversary of my reaching Kibo Peak, at about 18,500 feet, after a four-day hike. (The mountain’s other peak, Uhuru, is nearly 1,000 feet higher.) So, I have a particular interest in this mountain; and I have a more general interest in other mountains around the world, since the welfare of the entire planet matters.
The layers of ice on top of Kilimanjaro (to me Kili, for short) started forming over 10,000 years ago. Nearly 100 years ago, Kili had an ice cover of about 12 square kilometers; now that has shrunk to about two square kilometers (see before and after aerial photos at right). Some scientists fear that the glaciers could be completely gone in just another 20 years if they continue to melt at the current rate. The subsequent reduction in meltwater flowing down from the mountain could have devastating consequences for villagers dependent on the water for their livelihood.
There are conflicting ideas as to why Kili’s glaciers are melting. Most scientists agree that glaciers on other mountaintops may be melting due to a general global warming. Yet they think Kili’s melting may be due to an entirely different, natural cause. According to a National Academy of Sciences report in 2000, the “surface measurements of East Africa show no warming trend” and weather satellites even show “a pronounced cooling trend of the atmosphere there.” One idea is that the shrinking of the glaciers is actually part of a larger, long-term cycle of expansion and reduction of ice cover on the mountain. But another cause could be the deforestation that is occurring at the base of the mountain. The loss of trees, which normally absorb water vapor from clouds, affects the flow of moisture in the atmosphere. Less water vapor in the atmosphere means less snowfall (and ice formation) on the mountaintop.
I hope the glaciers will not disappear from Kili. The idea of seeing ice on the equator has enchanted people for generations. I, for one, remember the thrill of reaching the peak, collapsing against a boulder from exhaustion and oxygen deprivation, only to be told to “get up and turn around”! Doing so, I beheld the most incredible sight–an enormous valley filled with gorgeous ice-blue snow and glaciers at the top of the world. (To see my photograph of this view, see page 296 in Amsco’s Environmental Science, first edition.)
1 Comments on The Glaciers of Kilimanjaro, last added: 8/5/2008
I just finished reading a really scary book. It was not a horror story or science fiction, although science fiction is my genre of choice for reading on my commute (I’ve been a subscriber to the magazine Fantasy and Science Fiction for at least 20 years.). This book, Under a Green Sky: Global Warming, the Mass Extinctions of the Past and What They Can Tell Us About Our Future, by Peter D. Ward, Ph. D., is a book of science fact. Dr. Ward, a paleontologist, is a professor of biology and Earth and space sciences at the University of Washington in Seattle. He also serves as an astrobiologist for NASA.
The book begins by recounting the discovery of asteroid impact that doomed the dinosaurs about 65 million years ago. Prior to that discovery, scientists thought that extinction was a gradual process, not one that could happen over a relatively brief time. Dr. Ward knew that there had been other mass extinctions before and after the dinosaurs. He and others thought that perhaps these mass extinctions were also caused by impact events. He tells the readers that the search began to find impact craters that corresponded to other mass extinctions. These impact craters could not be found.
What he did discover, by studying fossils and the results of other scientists who studied ice cores and sea floor sediments, was that climate change seemed to have caused these extinctions. The cause of these changes in climate was a runaway greenhouse effect caused by increasing levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.
I found his predictions for our future, if we do not get our production of carbon dioxide under control, to be particularly frightening. The book predicts that if society cannot keep carbon dioxide levels below 450 parts per million (it was 380 parts per million and rising at 2 parts per million per year when the book was written in 2006) the temperature will rise, the ice caps will melt, the ocean currents that bring warm water north and cold water south will shut down, the oceans will become toxic, and there will be another greenhouse extinction and humans could be one of the victims. He says that we could be in real trouble by as early as 2100. Now that is scary.
I would recommend this book to Earth and environmental science teachers and all others interested in the future of our planet.
We’ve all seen the moon. Thanks to the Apollo missions, we know that the moon is not made of green cheese; it is made of rocks that are similar to igneous rocks found in Earth’s crust. The biggest difference between Earth rocks and moon rocks is that moon rocks lack water trapped in their crystals. Students often have misconceptions about our moon. I would like to discuss the following seven.
Myth 1. The moon revolves around Earth in one day. It takes the moon about a month to revolve around Earth. Because Earth rotates on its axis, we see the moon rise about once a day.
Myth 2. The far side of the moon is always dark. The far side of the moon receives as much light as the side that faces Earth. When we have a new moon, the far side of the moon is illuminated by the sun. During the first and last quarter phases, half of the side facing Earth and half of the side facing away from Earth are lit by the sun.
In the illustration above, the large moons represent what we would see from Earth’s surface. The small moons show how the moon is illuminated. I cut this figure from Amsco’s Reviewing Earth Science: The Physical Setting by Thomas McGuire.
Myth 3. Only one side of the moon faces Earth because the moon does not rotate on its axis. It is true that only one side of the moon faces Earth. However, the moon does rotate on its axis. Its period of rotation on its axis is equal to its period of revolution around Earth. That is, the moon rotates on its axis one time during each revolution around Earth.
Myth 4. The moon is never visible during the day.During certain phases of the moon it is easily visible during the day you just have to know where to look. The phases you can see during the day are: new crescent, first quarter, new gibbous, old gibbous, last quarter, and old crescent. For you to be able to see the moon during the day, the moon must be up in the sky at the same time as the sun, but not so close to the sun in the sky that you can't see it.
Myth 5. The phases of the moon are caused by Earth’s shadow falling on the moon. As you can see from the diagram above, the phases of the moon are the result of the amount of the moon’s illuminated surfaces that faces Earth. Earth’s shadow falls on the moon during a lunar eclipse.
Myth 6. The phases of the moon are caused by the moon moving into the sun’s shadow.The sun is a sphere that illuminates in all direction, and therefore it does not produce a shadow. See myth #5 and the diagram.
Myth 7. Different countries see different phases of the moon on the same day. I fear that my illustration may lead to this misconception. If I could animate the diagram you would see that Earth would rotate on its axis about 30 times as the moon revolved once around Earth. All parts of Earth see the same phase of the moon on the same day. However, people in different countries see the moon in a slightly different way. In the Southern Hemisphere, a person from the Northern Hemisphere would say that the moon is “upside down.” The sunlit side is the opposite from that seen in the Northern Hemisphere.
Moon phases as seen from the Northern Hemisphere.
Moon phases as seen from the Southern Hemisphere.
1 Comments on Seven Moon Myths, last added: 5/27/2008
Today, April 22, is officially celebrated as Earth Day across America. I remember some previous Earth Days, which were celebrated with festivals and concerts. However, I have always thought that every day should be treated as “Earth Day” because we should never lose sight of the fact that we live on a beautiful and ecologically vulnerable planet. In fact, I like to use my “Earth Day” stamp all year long on the envelopes of cards I send to friends. Fortunately, the message to live “green” seems to be much more prevalent today than it was when Earth Day was first started. For example, renewable energy sources are more abundant now, as are “greener” products for the home and workplace.
Now, thanks to the efforts of two dedicated Earth Science teachers, April 22 has been officially designated as Earth Day in New York State. I thought it worthwhile to share the message from these two educators:
Two weeks ago, I proposed to NYS Governor Paterson to make a proclamation regarding Earth Day 2008. I am pleased to say that this afternoon at school I received in the mail a signed proclamation from the Governor declaring April 22, 2008, as Earth Day in New York State. . . .
I hope each of us will celebrate this day with our students recognizing how precious our planet is, and how important it is to make our students aware of the current climate crisis and how energy use impacts the climate due to fossil fuel burning generated from the production of electricity. It takes approximately one pound of coal to produce a kilowatt hour of electricity. For every megawatt or 1,000 kilowatts of energy produced, it takes 1/2 ton of coal to be mined, causes 6 pounds of sulfur dioxide to be released into the environment, and over one ton of carbon dioxide to be released. Carbon dioxide, a major GHG, holds heat in the atmosphere, and our atmosphere and oceans are warming at unprecedented rates. Turning off your classroom lights for one hour on Earth Day 2008 (Earth Day for NYS Schools) will send an important message to our students and help protect the Earth. . . .
And for those of you who like entertainment in your classrooms, you may wish to share [the following video] with your students in celebration of Earth Day 2008! The Blue Man Group's YouTube musical message to spread the awareness of global warming:
Susan and Len Sharp Earth Science Educators Climate Project Ambassadors (VP Al Gore's Climate Project Program)
In addition, many environmental organizations have posted content related to Earth Day, like this Earth Day video from the Environmental Defense Fund:
The Ocean Conservancy has a “Start a Sea Change on Earth Day: Help Keep Trash out of the Ocean” pledge. Click here to visit this site and to sign their petition.
For my part (and to the unending embarrassment of my teenage son), I always try to pick up plastic bottles and plastic bags (especially the clear ones) from the street in my neighborhood. Besides the fact that the litter looks bad, its effect on the environment can be bad; the thought of these items washing down through the sewers, flowing into the oceans, and then being ingested by—and choking—an endangered sea turtle is more than I can stand. It really takes so little time and effort to potentially do so much.
So, have a good day; put litter in its place; recycle; and be good to your mother — Earth, that is!
0 Comments on Happy (B)Earth Day to You! as of 4/22/2008 3:35:00 PM
Anonymous said, on 4/23/2008 10:11:00 AM
Global Warming is a real as Global Cooling. Historically, warming and cooling periods alternate each other. We happen to be in a warming period. Would the same fear and hysteria take place if it were the other way around? YES.
In a secular world, "crises resolution" (whether the "crisis" is real or imaginary is incidental) has replaced religion. Hence, some global crisis that requires everyone to act united for the common good become the refuge of people looking for existential purpose.
Hopefully, this latest "global-warming crisis" will have the same fate as the "war against hunger," the "hole-in-the-ozone-layer crisis," the "year 2000 virus," the "save-the-rainforest" movement, the "SARS virus," etc.
Oh, wait a minute, I just remember that the world is supposed to end in 2012. We better find a way to stop time. Let's do it for the children...
Anonymous said, on 4/23/2008 10:26:00 AM
So what is the meaning of life, wise commentor? How should I spend my days?
March 20 marks the first full day of spring for 2008 in the northern hemisphere. This day is not picked as the start of spring simply because we notice that the weather is getting warmer or the flowers are starting to bloom. It is officially the first day of spring because of an important event in the movements of the sun and Earth in relation to each other. The seasons are caused by the tilt of Earth’s axis (23½º from the line perpendicular to its plane of orbit) and by its revolution around the sun. During our winter, the planet’s northern hemisphere is tilted away from the sun. During our summer, it is tilted toward the sun. On March 20 (or March 21 in some years), neither the northern nor the southern hemisphere is tilted toward the sun. The sun’s vertical rays strike the equator, and thus nearly all areas of our planet have equal periods of daylight and darkness. That is why the first day of spring is called the vernal equinox, vernal meaning “spring” and equinox meaning “equal night.” The same holds true for the first day of autumn (September 23); it is called the autumnal equinox. (For diagrams illustrating these changes, see Figure 9-10 on page 219 of Amsco’s Reviewing Earth Science: The Physical Setting, Second Edition.)
For thousands of years, people across the globe have celebrated the first day of spring. This time seems to herald a rebirth of the temporarily barren earth: leaves sprout, animals are born, and “spring cleaning” occurs (even in the editorial offices of Amsco)! Life seems more hopeful, with longer, warmer days on the horizon. Just Google the term “rites of spring” and you will see that there are hundreds of celebrations to start the new season -- everything from days-long musical festivals throughout the country to an annual rites-of-spring sports show in Wisconsin!
The mathematics of dates is deceptively straightforward and should be approached with caution, as many of us might have noticed last week when an intercalary day was observed in our solar calendar. Why did we have an extra day again?
Most youngsters can tell you that leap day happens once every 4 years (excluding the turn of each century) to make up for “lost time” in our calendar. Since our calendar is solar, we assign a date to each solar day. We also assign a year to each revolution of the Earth around the sun. The problem is, the actual length of a year, so defined, is not divisible by the length of a day, so defined. In fact a year is about equal to 365.25 days. So, most years we round down to the nearest day. Sounds fine, right? Why not leave it at that and forget this leap day nonsense all together?
Well, if we didn’t have leap day, our calendar would gradually slip behind the changing of the seasons and the observance of the holidays at a rate of about 1 day every 4 years. That means that if we went 100 years without any leap days, Christmas would be in January instead of December. If we went 700 years without any leap days, Christmas would be in June. Oh, the horror!
Okay, why don’t we dispense of leap day and instead, insert an extra quarter-day (6 hours) into EVERY calendar year? This would keep our holidays in the correct months, but it would create a similar problem with out solar days. Right now, we follow a medieval Christian tradition so that each day begins at midnight and lasts for exactly 24 hours. If we added a quarter day to each year, though, the measurement of days would be thrown off by 6 hours every year. For example, if in 1980 January 1 began at 12 midnight, then in 1981, January 1 would begin at 6:00 A.M.; in 1982 it would begin at 12:00 noon; and in 1983 it would begin at 6:00 P.M., and that would make for some really lousy New Year’s parties. (Among other, more significant lousiness.)
Some cultures don’t seem to care about their months wandering all over the season, like we do. Let’s look at the Islamic calendar, a lovely example of a lunar calendar. The months of a lunar calendar are the length of one lunar cycle (about 29 days) and therefore, the calendar is approximately 11 days shorter than our solar calendar. The Arabian calendar on which the Islamic calendar is modeled used an intercalary month (a leap month!) to remedy this discrepancy, but intercalary months are forbidden in the Koran and so the modern Islamic calendar falls 11 days behind ours every year. And no one seems to mind that the holidays move through the seasons without settling on a single spot in the solar year.
The Solar calendar that we use today, and the Islamic calendar, are two of the newest calendars around, though, and it is important to note that calendars become more mathematically simple the newer they are. If we go a little ways back in time, we discover that keeping track of the date used to be far more confusing than it is today.
It is not necessary to commit to following either a solar calendar or a lunar one. The Hebrew calendar, which has been in use for almost 6,000 years (give or take a few, 165 years from way back are, well, unaccounted for) is luni-solar. Like the Islamic calendar, the months are lunar. However, the framers of the Hebrew calendar were very concerned that the holidays correspond with specific seasonal changes, and so a system on intercalary months was designed to prevent that pesky loss of 11 days per year. Unfortunately, those leap months can be hard to keep track of. Our Solar calendar has a 4-year cycle, in which 3 years are standard and one is a “leap” year. The Hebrew calendar has a 19-year cycle, in which 12 of the years have 12 lunar months, and 7 of them have 13. So for every 19 years, there are 7 leap months. Wow! Convoluted!
What’s that? You would like to know of an even more elaborate method to keep track of the date? Well, we can go even farther back in time to Meso-America and there we find that the Mayans and Aztecs, among others, maintained at least TWO calendars: a 365-day solar calendar, and a 260-day calendar, derived either from numerology, the length of human gestation, or the interval between solar zeniths at Chiapas. Having two calendars creates a “calendar round” which is the length of the lowest common multiple of the number of days in each calendar. These two cycles, known to have been used by the Meso-Americans, align once every 52 solar years, or every 73 “gestation” years, and this alignment yielded 18,980 unique days for each “calendar round,” as the period was called. Since the average Mayan life expectancy back then was less than 52 years, years and calendar round were not numbered. Instead dates were recorded by their unique location within the calendar round. Meso-Americans are known now to have been excellent astronomers, but interestingly, there is no evidence that they ever availed themselves of intercalary days or months for the purposes of keeping their months and seasons consistent. It appears that while the Meso-Americans were aware of the discrepancy, they chose not to correct it, at least, not in their solar calendar.
Confusing enough for you?
While the math-y part of me loves that there have been and still are diverse systems of measurement that require many subtle mathematical operations to synchronize, the rest of me (some call this “the lazy part”) is relieved that the modern world has the International Organization for Standardization, which gives us an easy way to indicate dates within the Solar year with their Ordinal Dates. This system dispenses entirely with months (Accept it! Months are arbitrary vestiges of the lunar calendars we used ages ago!) and instead assigns an ordinal number to each date. In other words, instead of writing today’s date as 2008-03-05, I would write 2008-065, to indicate that today is the 65th day of the year 2008, and a system of dates that only requires two numbers is, after all this time, a relief.
0 Comments on Calendars, or, Nature Hates Math as of 1/1/1900
Jonathan said, on 3/10/2008 4:43:00 PM
Neat. I'm a luni-solar man, myself. Or rather, I have a personal calendar that doesn't correspond to anything but the seasons (hence my "year" consists of four "days," each with a different temperature). But it is reiterated to me time and time again that my personal calendar must remain personal, and that I should not attempt to make any plans with other people using my personal calendar. Rats!
When I taught at the Windsor School, a private 7–12 school in Queens, some 20 years ago, each grade covered one science subject. In grade seven it was pre-Earth science, in grade eight it was pre-biology, and in grade nine it was pre-chemistry. This worked just fine at that time. Students were exposed to each of the high-school-level sciences that would be offered to them in grades 10, 11, and 12.
However, things in education have changed since then. Many states, including New York, now have an eighth-grade exam that tests the entire middle school science curriculum. After studying one science per year, how many students, I wonder, will be able to remember what they learned in the first year of middle school through to the last year? To me, the solution is to cover some life science, some physical science, and some Earth science each year in a curriculum that spirals through the grades.
To help teachers and students, Amsco has just published Amsco’s Science: Grade 8, the third volume of our three-book middle school science series. Its purpose is to provide a complete, clear, and concise presentation of middle school science concepts, in life, Earth, and physical science in an integrated approach. This book builds on the information in Amsco’s Science: Grade 6, and Amsco’s Science: Grade 7. (Turn up the volume and watch our YouTube ad!)
The books in the series correlate 100% to the National Standards for middle school science, the NYS Middle School Core Curriculum for Grades 5–8, and the new Middle School Scope and Sequence for NYC. Each grade covers topics in life, Earth, and physical science. And at each grade level, a unique feature helps students make real-world connections to science. In the grade 6 textbook, the Career Planning section explores science-related careers. Grade 7's Science in Everyday Life feature shows students how science affects their lives. Grade 8 has Science Headline News, which zooms in on current events in science.
At each grade level, the Chapters are divided into Lessons as a planning aid for teachers. Lessons include Skill Activities, Web resources, and little-known science facts to spur student interest. Review sections contain questions of varying levels of difficulty to address the needs of all students. Extended-response questions challenge students to think, analyze, and write.
To order any or all books in the series, visit http://www.amscopub.com/ and click Online Purchasing and then General Science.
0 Comments on Middle School Science: What Is the Best Approach? as of 1/1/1900
The Wall St. Journal talks about people who shell out ten to fifteen thousand dollars in an effort to make their books #1 on Amazon or Barnes & Noble – if only for an hour.
"New York public-relations firm Ruder Finn says it can propel unknown titles to the top of rankings on Amazon.com and Barnes & Noble with a mass email called the Best-Seller Blast. Popular authors such as Mark Victor Hansen of the "Chicken Soup for the Soul" series recommend your book in messages to fans, and offer a deal: Buy the book today and you'll get downloadable "bonuses" supposedly valued at thousands of dollars -- such as recordings of motivational speeches and contact information for important people. Orchestrating even 1,000 book purchases in a single day can drive a title from obscurity to the top of the charts.
"Rick Frishman, who oversees the campaigns for Ruder Finn's Planned Television Arts, also is a client. His 2004 book "Networking Magic" went from a sales rank of 896,000 on barnesandnoble.com the morning it was published to No. 1 at 4 p.m. He has a poster in his office showing the sales chart he briefly topped. "I'm a nobody, but I was somebody for a day," he says."
(Full disclosure: My first book, Circles of Confusion, was once #43 on Amazon. I didn't spend any money to make that happen. And somewhere along the way, I've lost the printout, so you'll just have to believe me.)
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Inside Biosphere 2: Earth Science Under Glass
[Scientists in the Field]
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Moon phases as seen from the Northern Hemisphere.
Moon phases as seen from the Southern Hemisphere.
For thousands of years, people across the globe have celebrated the first day of spring. This time seems to herald a rebirth of the temporarily barren earth: leaves sprout, animals are born, and “spring cleaning” occurs (even in the editorial offices of Amsco)! Life seems more hopeful, with longer, warmer days on the horizon. Just Google the term “rites of spring” and you will see that there are hundreds of celebrations to start the new season -- everything from days-long musical festivals throughout the country to an annual rites-of-spring sports show in Wisconsin!
Confusing enough for you?
Readers might be interested to know that almost every book we manufacture is printed on FSC certified paper, meaning the sources can be traced to ensure it is not old growth product. Those that do not carry the FSC logo are printed on stock that is also certified but exempt from the logo as they contain an element that cannot by sourced – typically, for example, recycled board that the hardcovers are bound with. We also take steps to use wherever possible soy and/or vegetable based inks rather than petroleum.