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EPICA Dome C: Greenhouse gases over eight glacial cycles -
Ice cores are invaluable archives of past environmental conditions on Earth. In 1996, the European Project for Ice Coring in Antarctica (EPICA) set out to provide the longest ice-core climate record yet, by drilling a core from 3,270 m thick ice at a site known as Dome C in East Antarctica. The team's findings to date, including a complete Antarctic climate record over the past 800,000 years and atmospheric methane and carbon dioxide records from 650,000 years ago to the present, have significantly advanced our understanding of the Earth's climate over the past eight glacial cycles. Here Nature presents the latest results, the complete records of atmospheric methane and carbon dioxide over the past 800,000 years, along with some of the previous Dome C ice-core papers and a collection of related articles.
Energy for a cool planet
The most pressing technological problem facing the world is uncoupling the provision of energy from the production of carbon dioxide. Developed countries no longer need to increase their energy use in order to increase the size of their economies, but developing countries do. And yet to add more carbon dioxide to the Earth's atmosphere is to increase inexorably the chances of climatic chaos.
Ice Cores
Ice cores give a glimpse of the dramatic variations in climate that accompanied past ice ages. Even better, these frozen climate records can reveal much about the levels of atmospheric greenhouse gases while temperatures changed. Here Nature brings together groundbreaking new sets of results from both polar regions together with previous classic papers and other ice-core related articles.
Organic farming
Is organic the future of farming? In its pure form, maybe not. But elements of the organic philosophy are starting to be deployed in mainstream agriculture. Here, Nature analyses this trend, assesses the extent of organic farming, and frames the questions on which its wider adoption will depend.
Fossil fuels
The exploitation of fossil fuels to satisfy the majority of our energy needs drives continued and often heated public debate. Nature presents a focus on some of the many issues surrounding hydrocarbon fuel usage, from the economic, social and environmental impact to future energy resources.
GM crops: Time to choose
Today, just four countries account for 99% of the world's commercially grown transgenic crops. Others have been stalling over whether to embrace transgenic agriculture, but won't be able to put off the decision much longer. Here, Nature examines the state of play with special features and interactive graphics.
Global water crisis
More then one billion people in the world lack access to clean water, and things are getting worse. Read Nature's analysis of the global water crisis with a collection of news, features and interactive graphics.
Climate and water
A specially commissioned Insight on Climate and Water, together with a selection of recent articles handpicked from the pages of Nature, illuminating the connections between climate and water in ice, oceans and atmosphere.
Sustainable development
Reporting from the Johannesburg summit in 2002, Nature presents news, features and research on sustainable development
Food and the future
From BSE to GM, food is news. This focus brings together what seems to be a disparate selection of material recently published in Nature, illustrating, as well as anything can, how issues relating to food touch every sphere of human life.
