From tomorrow, for nearly two weeks Australia is hosting a huge meeting of earth scientists – many of them flying directly from their work at recent hot spots.

They will be providing the most up-to-date information on the Japanese tsunami, the safety of nuclear installations, the Christchurch earthquake, Cyclone Yasi, the ash clouds and more. They will also be putting all of this in context and reveal the bigger picture about our planet in all its moods.

The conference is Earth on the Edge, the 25^th General Assembly of the International Union of Geophysics and Geodesy (IUGG), and it has attracted almost 4,000 delegates from around 100 countries. [continue reading…]

In this bulletin: Finding life in extreme physical environments: expatriate Australian Professor Jillian Banfield among the five Laureates announced for 2011 L’Oréal Australian Fellows win 2010 Eureka Prizes Recent US survey shows that gender is still a major barrier for women in science Applying for Australian Fellowships for 2011 The signature of life…international Laureates announced […]

Released on behalf of the Australian Academy of Science.

We know more about the surface of Mars than we do of the earth beneath our feet. Australian earth scientists are calling for a national program to map our country – 300 metres down under.

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