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Plate tectonics has shaped the Earth's surface for billions of years: Continents and oceanic crust have pushed and pulled on each other, continually rearranging the planet's façade. As two massive plates collide, one can give way and slide under the other in a process called subduction. The subducted slab then slips down through the Earth's viscous mantle, like a flat stone through a pool of honey.

Researchers have studied satellite photographs of Lake Catalina, an ice-dammed lake in East Greenland -- and were truly amazed: Unnoticed by science as well as people living in the area, the lake has been the source of four major outburst floods over the last 50 years -- each representing an astounding mass of energy, equaling up to 240 Hiroshima-bombs, report investigators.

Methane hydrate under the ocean floor was assumed to be very sensitive to increasing ocean temperatures. But a new study shows that short term warming of the Arctic ocean barely affects it.

Using the most precise seafloor maps ever created of Antarctica's Ross Sea, researchers have discovered a long-dead river system that once flowed beneath Antarctica's ice and influenced how ice streams melted after Earth's last ice age.

A new study validates that the central core of the East Antarctic ice sheet should remain stable even if the West Antarctic ice sheet melts.

Flow of the Greenland Ice Sheet is likely to speed up in the future, despite a recent slowdown, because its outlet glaciers slide over wet sediment, not hard rock, new research based on seismic surveys has confirmed. This sediment will become weaker and more slippery as global temperatures rise and meltwater supply becomes more variable. The findings challenge the view that the recent slowdowns in ice flow would continue in the long term.

Research has solved the mystery of how the first animals appeared on Earth, a pivotal moment for the planet without which humans would not exist.

Certain lake predators are altering their behavior due to climate change, revealing what the future may hold for these fish and their food, scientists have discovered.

West Antarctica's vast ice sheet conceals what may be the largest volcanic region on Earth, new research has revealed.

Astronomers report that a lunar rock collected by NASA's Apollo 15 mission exhibits signs that it formed 1 to 2.5 billion years ago in the presence of a relatively weak magnetic field of about 5 microtesla. That's around 10 times weaker than Earth's current magnetic field but still 1,000 times larger than fields in interplanetary space today.

A bacterium living in the icy-cold waters of Antarctica manages to survive by gripping on to the ice surface. The protein used by the bacterium to do this -- a kind of extendable anchor -- has been detailed by a group of researchers. Quite special, because at 600 nanometers, it is one of the biggest proteins for which the structure has ever been identified.

The extent and depth of lakes in glaciated regions of North America are controlled by climate and the influence of differential isostatic rebound of the land's surface that began when Pleistocene ice melted from the continent. This relationship and the post-glacial history of Lake of the Woods -- one of the largest lake complexes in North America and the source of water for the city of Winnipeg -- is presented for the first time in a new study by five Canadian researchers.

A new report confirms that 2016 was another exceptionally warm year, with global temperature having reached 0.77± 0.09 degrees C above its level between 1961 and 1990.

The effects of climate change, which are apparent in other parts of the Antarctic continent, are not yet observed for glaciers in the western Ross Sea coast, new research indicates.

While the scientific community has long warned about rising sea levels and their destructive impact on some of the United States' most populous cities, researchers have developed a new, statistical method that more precisely calculates the rate of sea level rise, showing it's not only increasing, but accelerating.

Researchers have publicly released high-resolution maps of Antarctica's McMurdo Dry Valleys, a globally unique polar desert.

Researchers identify 'Karakoram vortex' and explain why glaciers near K2 are growing in size.

An abnormal season of intense glacial melt in 2002 triggered multiple distinct changes in the physical and biological characteristics of Antarctica's McMurdo Dry Valleys over the ensuing decade, report investigators.

On the North Slope of Alaska, snow is melting earlier in the spring and the snow-in date is happening later in the fall, according to a new study.

An endangered bat species with a UK population of less than 1,000 could be further threatened by the effects of global warming, according to a new study.