Skip to main content
A red and rayed aurora was captured in a single 6-second exposure from Racibórz, Poland, May 10, 2024. The photographer's friend, seeing an aurora for the first time, is visible in the distance also taking images of the beautifully colorful nighttime sky. Photo by Mariusz Durlej via NASA APOD

Solar storm – not HAARP – creates intense auroral display

Geophysical Institute
May 13, 2024
Night skies over the weekend erupted with vivid colors and awed people all around the globe as the solar wind from a severe geomagnetic storm...
Read more  
The aurora was photographed in 2014 during a series of Hubble Space Telescope Imaging Spectrograph far-ultraviolet-light observations taking place as NASA’s Juno spacecraft approached and entered into orbit around Jupiter. Image by NASA, ESA and J. Nichols (University of Leicester)

UAF scientist’s research answers big question about our system’s largest planet

Geophysical Institute
May 3, 2024
New discoveries about Jupiter could lead to a better understanding of Earth’s own space environment and influence a long-running scientific...
Read more  
Students from several Alaska communities, most of them remote and off the state's road system, presented their seismology research Wednesday. Photo by Rod Boyce

Alaska high school students present research at seismology conference

Geophysical Institute
May 1, 2024
Radiation monitoring. Sea ice changes. Floodwater alerts. Coastal erosion. Speeding drivers. Landslide warnings. Thawing permafrost. Weather...
Read more  
Scientists attending the Seismological Society of America annual meeting in Anchorage view the hazardous Barry Arm landslide area while on a science cruise in Prince William Sound on April 29, 2024. Photo by Rod Boyce

Seismologists get close-up look at hazardous Barry Arm landslide

Geophysical Institute
April 29, 2024
A high point for about 300 seismologists, geologists and other scientists gathering in Anchorage for a weeklong conference came Monday, April 29...
Read more  
The mini-science camp on the Beaufort Sea ice two-thirds of a mile north of a thin snow-covered spit above Elson Lagoon, about 10 miles east of Utqiagvik. Photo by Bryan Whitten

UAF researchers use drones to test new instrument for measuring sea ice thickness and its snow cover

Geophysical Institute
April 29, 2024
BEAUFORT SEA ICE, near Utqiagvik, Alaska — The train of 10 snowmachines snaked slowly across the snow-covered sea ice toward the small tent far...
Read more  
Lava erupts at Pavlof Volcano, shown in a short-wave infrared false-color image from Jan. 19, 2022. A discussion of research into the eruption is one of more than 1,000 presentations at the Seismological Society of America annual meeting. Image by Hannah Dietterich, Alaska Volcano Observatory

UAF researchers head to Anchorage for nation’s largest seismology conference

Geophysical Institute
April 25, 2024
University of Alaska Fairbanks seismologists, staff and students will be in Anchorage next week for the annual national meeting of the...
Read more  
National Science Foundation Director Sethuraman Panchanathan. National Science Foundation/Photo by Stephen Voss

NSF director: 'I am grateful to UAF’s partnership'

Geophysical Institute
April 24, 2024
Dr. Sethuraman Panchanathan became the 15th director of the National Science Foundation in June 2020 when the U.S. Senate confirmed his...
Read more  
The gear building where the SALVO team prepares for a trip to their snow research site. Photo by Rod Boyce

SALVO: Studying how snow melts on tundra and sea ice

Geophysical Institute
April 20, 2024
The five University of Alaska Fairbanks researchers didn’t mind the constant wind that gusted to about 30 mph across the flat whiteness on...
Read more  
Citizen science photos (a, b) show a large open water zone on Dec. 20, 2020, on the Tanana River near Rosie Creek. The photos confirm the synthetic aperture radar classifications (c) from the same date. Red, blue and black arrows point to the same landmarks in all panels. Image from research paper.

New radar analysis method can improve winter river safety

Geophysical Institute
April 12, 2024
University of Alaska Fairbanks researchers have developed a way to use radar to detect open water zones and other changes in Alaska’s frozen...
Read more