A team of volcanologists who observed the colossal 2018 eruption of Kīlauea, Hawai’i, have tracked how potentially toxic metals carried in its gas plumes were transported away from the volcano to be deposited on the landscape.
Researchers have uncovered evidence suggesting that volcanic carbon emissions were not a major driver in Earth’s most recent extinction event.
Specially-adapted drones, developed by an international team involving scientists from the University of Cambridge, are transforming how we forecast eruptions by allowing close-range measurements of previously inaccessible and hazardous volcanoes
Researchers have shown that over the past two thousand years, volcanoes have played a larger role in natural temperature variability than previously thought, and their climatic effects may have contributed to past societal and economic change.
Dr Emma Liu travels to some of the world's most active volcanoes to understand what makes them erupt. Her latest work is helping a Pacific community to monitor the restless mountain they live with.
Fiona Iddon is a PhD student in the Department of Earth Sciences, where she studies volcanoes. Here, she tells us about making science accessible, being the first in her family to go to university, and working at the place where the horn of Africa is splitting away from the rest of the continent.
The molten rock that feeds volcanoes can be stored in the Earth’s crust for as long as a thousand years, a result which may help with volcanic hazard management and better forecasting of when eruptions might occur.
Victoria Honour is a PhD candidate in the Department of Earth Sciences, who studies magma and emulsions. Emulsions are generally studied for making things like mayonnaise, ice cream, moisturiser or in the petroleum industry for petrol or diesel. But Victoria looks at them to see how molten rock (magma) solidifies when it’s trapped beneath the Earth’s surface. Here, she tells us about her research, camping in Greenland and volcanic eruptions.
The chemical composition of gases emitted from volcanoes – which are used to monitor changes in volcanic activity – can change depending on the size of gas bubbles rising to the surface, and relate to the way in which they erupt. The results, published in the journal Nature Geoscience, could be used to improve the forecasting of threats posed by certain volcanoes.
Memories of the largest lava flood in the history of Iceland, recorded in an apocalyptic medieval poem, were used to drive the island’s conversion to Christianity, new research suggests.
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