Trees benefit our communities in may ways, and we’re getting better at understanding those ways.  Kathy Wolf’s work is cited in this short article about the continuing research on the effects of trees on people, communities and cities. 

Over 2005 to 2009, the School of Oceanography published 566 papers, or 2.25% of the entire body of work for that time period, according to a Thompson-Reuters analysis.  The only school more prolific was Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute, with 766 papers, or 3.04%.  Read more here. 

A team of 9 researchers, including Atmospheric Sciences’ David Catling, has published a paper in the December issue of Astrobiology that enumerates two ways of narrowing down the growing number of known exoplanets and exomoons to those that might harbor life – an Earth Similarity Index (ESI) for categorizing a planet’s more earth-like features and a Planetary Habitability Index (PHI) for describing a variety of chemical and physical parameters that are theoretically conducive to life in more extreme, less-earthlike conditions.  

The cold weather over the weekend highlighted the temperature “convergence zone” in the Puget Sound.  This video from Atmospheric Sciences shows how clouds flow across the lower airspace above the Puget Sound, as the air warmed by the water is displaced by the colder air flowing off of the land. https://youtube.com/watch?v=KCq5lLSX9WA%3Ffeature%3Dplayer_embedded 

Washington’s forests are deteriorating so quickly the state commissioner of public lands says he’ll appoint an emergency panel to seek ways to stabilize the situation or reverse the decline. Jerry Franklin, professor of forest resources, is quoted.