26.02.2025/Kiel. The south-western Baltic Sea has about 3,000 kilograms of dissolved toxic chemicals released from unexploded ordnance, according to a new study by the GEOMAR Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research Kiel. The substances were detected in almost all water samples taken in 2017 and 2018, with particularly high concentrations in the Bights of Kiel and Lübeck. The levels are still below thresholds for health risk, but highlight the urgent need for munitions clearance to minimise long-term risks. The study has now been published in the journal Chemosphere.

In a new study published by Risk Analysis, uses recent, disaster-related data from the Household Pulse Survey (HPS) to train a computer model to predict the length of household displacement and return outcomes after a disaster. The study is the first to use state-by-state data from the U.S. Census Bureau to quantify the contribution of different factors (including household size, tenure status, educational attainment, and income per household member) on household displacement and return.

Humanity’s oldest and longest-running climate experiment, the International Polar Year (IPY), will run for the fifth time in history next decade, with IPY-5 planned for 2032-2033. IPY-5 could be the most consequential iteration of the experiment yet, writes researcher Paul Arthur Berkman in a new paper in Cambridge Prisms: Coastal Futures. There is no time to lose in studying the Arctic and working towards climate solutions. The Arctic in particular is also a region of geopolitical complexities with superpowers, and Arctic research is incomplete without all nations.