Photo of a nearly full Moon shining brightly on the Earth’s atmosphere, taken from the International Space Station.
NASA
The Earth’s magnetic field was most likely weaker when life evolved on our planet than it is today.
Breathing pure oxygen would be like fireworks exploding in your body. And that’s not always a good thing.
Shutterstock
You might think the more oxygen you breathe in the better. But too much oxygen can make you sick.
When Hurricane Dorian, seen here from the International Space Station, stalled over the Bahamas in September 2019, its winds, rain and storm surge devastated the islands.
NASA
Hurricane stalling has become common over the past half-century, and their average forward speed has also slowed.
A red hazy sunset over Indiana caused by wildfire smoke from the Western U.S.
SOPA Images/LightRocket va Getty Images
Last week, much of the Midwest and eastern US experienced hazy skies and red sunsets. The cause was smoke transported from the Western US by the jet stream and spread as far as Boston and even Europe.
Sam Schooler/Unsplash
Clouds can act as both blanket and parasol – warming our atmosphere at the same time as cooling it. But which effect will dominate?
John Tyndall.
wellcome/wikipedia
The man who explained the greenhouse effect was accidentally killed by his wife.
Ashleigh Wilson
Carbon emissions are chilling the atmosphere 90km above Antarctica, at the edge of space
They may look comfy to sit on but you’d plummet through and hit the ground.
Sam Schooler/Unsplash
You might have already felt what it would be like inside a cloud made of condensed water vapor.
Unlike Earth’s atmosphere, Jupiter’s ‘sky’ hosts magnificent shades of orange, white, brown and blue.
NASA/JPL-Caltech/SwRI/MSSS/Gerald Eichstädt
Atmospheres can be all different colours, depending on what’s in them.
A lithograph from Gaston Tissandier’s balloon travels depicts falling stars.
Archive.org
Not so long ago, people had no idea what would happen to them – and what they would see – once they ascended into the clouds.
Warming in the Arctic is more intense than it is in the rest of the world.
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More than 600 experts will spend the next year drifting in Arctic waters to gain a better understanding of how climate change is affecting the region and how it can be fought.
The Orbiting Carbon Observatory satellite makes precise measurements of Earth’s carbon dioxide levels from space.
NASA/JPL
Carbon dioxide makes up less than one-twentieth of 1% of Earth’s atmosphere. How does this relatively scarce gas control Earth’s thermostat?
Fire consumes an area near Jaci Parana, state of Rondonia, Brazil, Aug. 24, 2019.
AP Photo/Eraldo Peres
If the Amazon rainforest functions as our planet’s lungs, what do raging wildfires threaten? An atmospheric scientist explains why the fires, though devastating, won’t suffocate life on Earth.
The air up high is just really bad at ‘holding’ onto the radiation coming from the Sun, and the warmth passes straight through it on its journey toward the ground.
Kevin Spencer/flicr
It helps if you imagine the ground here on Earth as a big heater. It keeps us warm, and if you move away from the heater you feel cold.
Very beautiful, and useful too.
Shutterstock.
An expert explains all the wonderful ways the atmosphere protects life on Earth.
Flying high.
Shutterstock.
It’s hard to believe, but big storms and hurricanes are caused by tiny particles moving around in the atmosphere.
The ocean absorbs about 90 percent of the excess heat produced as climate change warms the earth.
Image Catalog
According to a new study, the oceans have absorbed more heat from climate change than previously thought. This could mean the Earth will warm even faster in the future than scientists have predicted.
Unleashing hell.
Everett Historical/Shutterstock
Scientists studying the atmosphere found help in an unlikely place – the aerial bombing campaigns of World War Two.
The colorful cloud belts dominate Jupiter’s southern hemisphere in this image captured by NASA’s Juno spacecraft.
NASA/JPL-Caltech/SwRI/MSSS/Kevin M. Gill
Jupiter’s bands are one of its most striking features – and can be seen from Earth – but they only go so deep within the giant planet. Now scientists think they know why.
NASA’s Cassini spacecraft captures Saturn’s largest moon, Titan, passes in front of the planet and its rings.
NASA/JPL-Caltech/Space Science Institute
Titan is more than a billion kilometres from our Sun but occasionally it’s shadow can be seen here on Earth, with the right technology. That’s what scientists gathered in Western Australia to observe.