Earth and Environmental Science

Studying plants from 400 miles up

Using remote sensing data, senior Paul Lin looked for signals of climate change in the grasslands of the Great Plains.

Katherine Unger Baillie

Penn group wins EPA Campus RainWorks Challenge

The student-led project will reimagine the campus of West Philadelphia’s Andrew Hamilton School, including vegetable gardens, a food forest, and other green stormwater-management tools.

Katherine Unger Baillie

From animals to people and back again

Penn researchers are studying the propensity of SARS-CoV-2 to cross between species, and they are working to protect people, pets, and wildlife from COVID-19 infection.

Katherine Unger Baillie

Climate change doesn’t spare the smallest

Changing conditions have taken a toll on insects in the tropics, according to research by School of Arts & Sciences biologists Daniel Janzen and Winnie Hallwachs. But education and science offer a path forward, they say.

Katherine Unger Baillie

Rare sparrows make guest appearance at Penn

Earlier this year, Penn Medicine epidemiologist Doug Wiebe glimpsed two small all-white birds outside Van Pelt Library that turned out to be albino house sparrows. Their coloration is likely the result of a genetic condition in which a bird’s feathers lack pigment.

Michele W. Berger



In the News


Sydney Morning Herald (Australia)

Scientists struggle to explain ‘really weird’ spike in world temperatures

Michael Mann of the School of Arts & Sciences says that tendencies to exaggerate climate science in favor of “doomist” narratives helps no one except the fossil fuel industry.

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Vox.com

Spring is here very early. That’s not good

Michael Mann of the School of Arts & Sciences says that plant-flowering, tree-leafing, and egg-hatching are all markers associated with spring that are happening sooner.

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The New York Times

We don’t have time for climate misinformation

In a co-written Op-Ed, Michael Mann of the School of Arts & Sciences says that meaningful decarbonization in the U.S. is in jeopardy of being blocked or slowed if a significant portion of the electorate does not accept the basic scientific facts and implications of climate change.

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NPR

A famous climate scientist is in court, with big stakes for attacks on science

Michael Mann of the School of Arts & Sciences is suing a right-wing author and a policy analyst for defamation against the “hockey stick” climate change graph.

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USA Today

‘Category 5’ was considered the worst hurricane. There’s something scarier, study says

Michael Mann of the School of Arts & Sciences says that Earth is experiencing a new class of monster storms thanks to the effects of human-caused warming.

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CNN

The Doomsday Clock reveals how close we are to total annihilation

Michael Mann of the School of Arts & Sciences says that the Doomsday Clock, while an imperfect metaphor, remains an important rhetorical device to remind people of the tenuousness of their current existence.

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