Tropics encroaching on temperate climate zones

September 28th, 2009 WASHINGTON - A new study by researchers at MIT and Caltech has predicted that global warming may lead to heavier rainstorms in the future. Previous studies have shown that average annual precipitation will increase in both the deep tropics and in temperate zones, but will decrease in the subtropics.

September 26th, 2009 WASHINGTON - In a new study, scientists have found evidence that climate swings in the northern hemisphere over the past 12,000 years have been tightly linked to changes in the tropics. The scientists found that a prolonged cold spell that caused glaciers in Europe and North America to creep forward several hundred years ago may have affected climate patterns as far south as Peru, causing tropical glaciers there to expand as well.

September 23rd, 2009 WASHINGTON - New, three-dimensional imaging of Martian north-polar ice layers by a radar instrument on NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter matches with theoretical models of Martian climate swings during the past few million years. Alignment of the layering patterns with the modeled climate cycles provides insight about how the layers accumulated.

September 16th, 2009 TORONTO - Ozone layer alterations, prompted by climate change, will enhance ultraviolet (UV) radiation in the tropics and Antarctica, according to a discovery by physicists. Climate change is an established fact, but scientists are only just beginning to understand its regional manifestations, said Michaela Hegglin, a physics researcher at the University of Toronto (U-T) and lead study author.

September 16th, 2009 TORONTO - A new study by University of Toronto (U of T) physicists has shown that climate change will lead to less ultraviolet radiation over northern high latitudes. They discovered that changes in the Earth's ozone layer due to climate change will reduce the amount of ultraviolet (UV) radiation in northern high latitude regions such as Siberia, Scandinavia and northern Canada.

September 4th, 2009 WASHINGTON - A new study has determined that species living in restricted environments such as the tropics may lack adequate variation in their genes and be unable to adapt to climate change. Adaptation is a physiological or behavioural change that makes an organism better suited to its environment, and more likely to survive and reproduce.

August 18th, 2009 WASHINGTON - A new study has shown that climate change will yield more extreme rainfall in the future. The study was carried out by researchers at MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology) and Caltech.

July 28th, 2009 SYDNEY - Mammals living in the tropics are evolving faster than those inhabiting cooler regions, according to a new study. Previously, it had been assumed that rates of genetic change in warm-blooded animals were independent of climate.

July 11th, 2009 WASHINGTON - A team of international experts has determined that governments have largely failed to seriously implement integrated management in coastal zones, placing people at risk of disasters such as hurricane Katrina and the Banda Aceh tsunami. This was the conclusion of 40 international experts from wide ranging disciplines including economics, social sciences and natural sciences who met for an intensive, 5 day workshop near Oslo, Norway.

July 6th, 2009 Oxfam to G-8: Climate change will spread hungerAMSTERDAM — Chronic hunger may be "the defining human tragedy of this century," as climate change causes growing seasons to shift, crops to fail, and storms and droughts to ravage fields, an advocacy group said. Oxfam International released a report Monday as leaders of the Group of Eight wealthiest nations prepare to meet in Italy this week, with an agenda to include both food security and climate change.

July 6th, 2009 Sydney, July 6 (ANI): Australian experts have warned that the globe's tropical zone is expanding rapidly and more research is needed to help humans adapt to the changing climate, which means less rain. According to a report by ABC News, the finding is a result of a review of over 70 scientific papers done by climate researchers Professor Steve Turton and Dr Joanne Isaacs of James Cook University in Cairns, who have documented the rapid advance of the tropical zone.

June 17th, 2009 SYDNEY - A new study has found that mountain ash forests in Australia are the best in the world at locking up carbon. According to a report by ABC News, the study has been carried out by environmental scientist Professor Brendan Mackey of the Australian National University and colleagues.

May 30th, 2009 SYDNEY - Australian researchers have said that ancient refuges could be the key to saving the country's unique biodiversity under threat from climate change. According to a report by ABC News, the researchers are mapping areas they believe could remain untouched, despite climate change, in an effort to save species from extinction.

January 19th, 2009 SYDNEY - New maps of the earth's surface during the peak of the last Ice Age points to northern Australia become wetter and southern Australia drier due to climate change in future. 'During the last Ice Age - around 20,000 years ago - sea surface temperature was as much as 10 degrees colder than present and icebergs would have been regular visitors to the southern coastline of Australia,' Timothy Barrows of the Research School of Earth Sciences at Australian National University (ANC) said.

January 11th, 2009 SYDNEY - Global warming will severely damage crop output in tropical regions and deprive half the world of food by the century-end, according to a study. The population of the equatorial belt will bear the brunt of unprecedented shortages, home to the poorest on earth.