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FROM TOP: ARCTIC IMAGES/ALAMY STOCK PHOTO; THOMAS PARK/UIC; JAY SMITH, ADAPTED BY PERMISSION FROM MACMILLAN PUBLISHERS LTD: NATURE NEWS 543, 7645, MARCH 16, 2017A New Look
at Mega-Eruptions
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INDIA’S DECCAN TRAPS — geologically defined as
a large igneous province (LIP) — formed when a
massive volcanic eruption spread lava over hundreds
of thousands of square miles. The event also released toxic
gases and altered Earth’s temperature, helping to kill off the
dinosaurs some 66 million years ago.
But the Deccan Traps are not unique. Remnants of
similar LIPs, spawned during world-altering eruptions, exist
from Siberia to Australia. In March, researchers released
a new map of them, including previously unknown sites.
To create the map, Carleton University geologist Richard
Ernst documented telltale signs of LIPs: large fractures in
Earth’s crust. He then dated the volcanic events using rock
samples from colleagues.
“My lesson from this is that the Earth can go through
dramatic changes,” he says. “The planet doesn’t particularly
care about the biology on it.” ERIC BETZBreathless
Wonders
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SOMEHOW, NAKED MOLE
RATS got even weirder in 2017.
It turns out the coldblooded,
cancer-resistant, pain-immune and
conspicuously long-lived rodents also
can survive for extended periods of time
without oxygen.
In tests at the University of Illinois at
Chicago, biologists (carefully) deprived
naked mole rats of oxygen for 18 minutes;
in a separate test, the researchers
kept them for more than five hours at
dangerously low oxygen levels. Both times,
the naked mole rats were unharmed.
Most animals need oxygen to survive
because it helps convert blood sugar, or
glucose, into energy — no oxygen, no
life. In the study published in April in
Science, researchers found that naked
mole rats use glucose this way, too,
but it turns out their bodies can switch
things up and efficiently metabolize
fructose. It’s a different kind of sugar
that doesn’t require oxygen to provide
life-sustaining energy.
These insights into oxygenless survival
could one day help stroke and heart
attack patients, for whom every minute
without oxygen is critical.
NATHANIEL SCHARPING- Widgiemooltha 2.42 billion years
- Ungava 2.22 billion years
- Bushveld 2.05 billion years
- Timpton 1.75 billion years
- Essakane 1.52 billion years
- Dashigou 920 million years
- Gairdner 820 million years
- Franklin 725 million years
9. Kola-Dneiper 370 million years
10. Siberian Traps 252 million years
11. Central Atlantic Magmatic
Province 200 million years
12. Ontong Java 120 million years
13. Deccan Traps 66 million years
14. Afro-Arabian 30 million years
15. Columbia River 17 million years
Largest eruptions, showing extent of lava flow12345678
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