As humanity's exploration of the Earth's internal structure deepens, Earth's free oscillations, serving as crucial "fingerprints" for revealing the large-scale structure and dynamic processes within the Earth, have always been a core subject in geophysics. Ground-based station observations are currently the mainstream method for measuring Earth's free oscillations. With the advancement of space technology, high-precision inter-satellite distance measurement holds the potential to become a novel method for detecting these oscillations.

In a recent paper published in Space: Science & Technology, a research team from the School of Physics and Astronomy at Sun Yat-sen University, in collaboration with the TianQin Research Center for Gravitational Physics, proposed a novel detection and analysis method for Earth's free oscillations utilizing the "TianQin" space-borne gravitational wave detector. The study constructed a theoretical response model for Earth's free oscillations within the TianQin detector and derived their analytical waveform for high-orbit satellite laser interferometric measurements. Through numerical simulation and Bayesian parameter estimation, the research team demonstrated that for a major seismic event like the 2008 Wenchuan earthquake, TianQin could achieve a clear detection with a signal-to-noise ratio as high as 73 and independently distinguish at least nine different free oscillation modes.

Kyoto, Japan -- Mangrove forests are natural wonders that protect coastal areas, particularly in tropical and subtropical regions. They are able to dissipate wave energy and limit flooding, which can even mitigate tsunamis and coastal inundations during tropical cyclones. For this reason, mangroves are attracting attention as Nature-based Solutions, or NbS: natural infrastructure with the potential to enhance coastal resilience in an environmentally friendly way.

As climate change is altering ocean conditions and intensifying storms, many coastal communities face growing risks from flooding and extreme wave events; hence mangroves can serve to both mitigate disasters and help communities adapt to climate change. However, these forests remain underutilized in engineering applications due to a limited understanding of how they interact with hydrodynamic forces. Accurately modeling their complex root structures, known as prop-roots, while quantifying their wave attenuation effects has posed a particular challenge.

A collaborative team of researchers from Kyoto University's Disaster Prevention Research Institute resolved to address this knowledge gap. "Japan has a long history of using pine trees for coastal defense, and we want to apply this knowledge to mangroves to develop smart, cost-effective disaster risk reduction," says first author Yu-Lin Tsai.

The Pacific Northwest has seen below-normal snow this season — and new research from Portland State University suggests that the region's snowmelt-dependent water resources could face growing challenges in the years ahead as forest fires and winter rainstorms become more frequent.

Researchers have created the first map of a network of subglacial lakes in the Canadian Arctic showing 33 bodies of water under glaciers.

Using a decade of ArcticDEM satellite data of the Earth’s surface height, a team of researchers including the University of Waterloo developed a method that allowed them to track the draining and filling of active subglacial lakes in unprecedented detail.

A newly discovered fossil site in southwest China has transformed our understanding of how complex animal life emerged on Earth, revealing that many key animal groups had already evolved before the start of the Cambrian Period. The study, led by researchers at Oxford University’s Museum of Natural History and Department of Earth Sciences as well as Yunnan University in China, has been published today (02 April) in Science.