Ever seen the northern lights? You have a magnetic layer in Earth’s atmosphere to thank for those beautiful displays. But the magnetosphere does a lot more than create auroras.
Geese fly day or night, depending on when conditions are best.
sharply_done/E+ via Getty Images
Geese honk loudly and point their bills toward the sky when they’re ready to start the migration. Here’s how they know it’s time, how they navigate and how they conserve energy on the grueling trip.
Very rarely, depending on where you are in the world, your compass can actually point to true north.
https://www.shutterstock.com
Recently, magnetic compasses at Greenwich pointed directly at true north for the first time in 360 years. This is currently happening in Western Australia too. But what does it mean?
The orientations of the stone walls that crisscross the Northeastern U.S. can tell a geomagnetic tale as well as a historical one.
John Delano
John Delano, University at Albany, State University of New York
Scientific inspiration struck a geologist after many walks through the woods in New York and New England. These ruins hold the secret of where the compass pointed north when they were built centuries ago.