The history of Earth is written on the great tablets of tectonic plates. The motions of plates shaped land masses, formed ...

It's tough accomplishing everything we want to get done in a day. But it would have been even more difficult had we lived earlier in Earth's history. Although we take the 24-hour day for granted, in ...

Millions of people around the world will pause on Tuesday, at least for a moment, to mark Earth Day. It's an annual event founded by people who hoped to stir activism to clean up and preserve a planet ...

Today, as in the beginning, life is still made out of carbon dioxide, and the world’s problems are made out of carbon dioxide as well.” ...

Life made the modern Earth as much as the Earth made life, a new book by a philosopher of consciousness argues. That dynamic leaves humans with a unique set of moral questions, Peter Godfrey-Smith of ...

Earth's magnetic field preserved the planet's habitability at two key points in its history, scientists have said. By developing a strong shield around the planet early after it formed, the magnetic ...

Over four millennia ago, in the final days of the Akkadian Empire in Mesopotamia, a drought swept over the region, afflicting lands as far away as Greece and what’s now Pakistan. Probably driven by ...

Unfortunately, this book can't be printed from the OpenBook. If you need to print pages from this book, we recommend downloading it as a PDF. Visit NAP.edu/10766 to get more information about this ...

Exploring LIDAR: Tech using lasers to reveal the deep history beneath our world’s surface. The Channeled Scablands of the Pacific Northwest hide an astonishing secret. Evidence of a massive flood that ...

Researchers studying the deep biosphere, Earth’s largest ecosystem, have found evidence that life thriving miles below the planet’s surface may have played a far bigger role in shaping atmospheric ...