Earthweek: a diary of the planet

For the week ending Friday, Jan. 27.

Solar confusion

After the discovery that some birds can “see” Earth’s magnetic field through magnetoreceptors in their eyes, researchers say geomagnetic storms from solar flares and sunspots can cause some migrators to wind up at the wrong destinations. By comparing records of 2.2 million birds captured and released from 1960 to 2019 with records of geomagnetic disturbances, a

UCLA team found a strong correlation between birds found far outside their expected range and the geomagnetic storms during migrations. They say the wayward migrations during such storms may help species survive as their traditional homes become uninhabitable.

Antarctic find

A colony of about 500 emperor penguins was found in a nearly inaccessible area where the species is under threat from global heating. The British Antarctic Survey made the discovery by examining satellite images. “Like many of the recently discovered sites, this colony is small and in a region badly affected by recent sea-ice loss,” said researcher Peter Fretwell. Emperor penguins are the only ones that breed on sea ice instead of land.

CO2 removal

A study finds that about 2.2 billion tons of CO2 are being removed from the atmosphere each year, and that most of it is from recently planted trees and better soil management. There are growing efforts through new technology to extract the greenhouse gas directly from the atmosphere and put it in long-term storage on land, in the ocean, in geological formations or in products. But researchers from the University of Oxford estimate that more than 1,300 times more carbon dioxide needs to be extracted from the air than is currently being captured.

Touchscreen wizards

About 240 vervet monkeys in South Africa’s Mawana Game Reserve have become the first primates in the wild to learn how to use a touchscreen. The iNkawu Vervet Project says the breakthrough will allow scientists to test the intelligence of nonhuman primates without keeping them in enclosures. The wild vervets began to interact with the screen after it was attached to a tree and connected to a Wi-Fi hotspot. The vervets learned how to interact with the screen and receive rewards based on their interactions.

Core spinning

How Earth’s core spins differently from its surface layer has long been argued, and a report from Chinese scientists has still not put the issue to rest. Xiaodong Song and Yi Yang of China’s Peking University say they have found the inner core’s rotation “came to near halt around 2009 and then turned in an opposite direction.” Based on seismic data, they write in the journal Nature Geoscience that the core swings back and forth over a 70-year period. But studies by other scientists indicate that the inner core moved differently than the surface only between 2001 and 2013, and has since stopped. An Australian study says the core’s cycle of rotation is about every 20 to 30 years.