Articles for category: Ecology, Plants

Moss Campion: The Cushion of Life

The Plant That Traps Air for Warmth — And Lives on Frozen Mountains

Trizzy Orozco

Imagine standing on a windswept mountain ridge, the world below blanketed in shimmering snow, biting winds howling all around. Suddenly, you spot an emerald green cushion, almost like a secret garden nestled in the ice. This isn’t just any plant. It’s a marvel of nature—a living, breathing heater, defying the cold by trapping air for ...

Agricultural Transformation

The River That Disappeared: America’s Lost Waterways

Annette Uy

Picture a river so massive it could swallow the Mississippi whole, flowing where Los Angeles now sprawls under endless concrete. Imagine waterways that once carved through what we call Silicon Valley, their banks lined with ancient oaks instead of tech campuses. These aren’t fantasy landscapes from another planet—they’re the ghost rivers of America, waterways that ...

Lessons from the Underground Forest

The Underground Forest of Missouri: A Hidden Ecosystem Beneath Our Feet

Trizzy Orozco

Imagine walking through Missouri’s rolling hills, feeling the crunch of leaves beneath your boots, and never suspecting that just a few feet below, an entire forest pulses with silent, unseen life. It’s not a myth or a fantasy—it’s the reality of the underground forest, a mysterious and vibrant ecosystem hidden right beneath our feet. While ...

The Ancient Weight of Glaciers: Nature’s Gigantic Press

How Scientists Track Glaciers From Space (And Why It’s Getting Harder)

Trizzy Orozco

Imagine gazing up at the night sky, knowing that hundreds of miles above you, satellites are quietly watching Earth’s frozen giants—glaciers—as they creep, crack, and melt. It sounds like science fiction, but it’s real. And as climate change throws everything out of balance, keeping tabs on these icy rivers from space has never been more ...

How Subterranean Rivers Shape Entire Continents Without Us Noticing

How Subterranean Rivers Shape Entire Continents Without Us Noticing

Annette Uy

Beneath your feet right now, as you read these words, massive rivers are flowing through darkness. They’re carving canyons deeper than the Grand Canyon, moving billions of gallons of water across continents, and reshaping the very ground we walk on. Yet most of us live our entire lives without ever thinking about these hidden waterways ...

Desert Earless Lizard.

New Mexico’s “White Sands” Lizard Evolution: How an Entire Species Changed Color for Survival

Trizzy Orozco

In the heart of New Mexico lies a vast, otherworldly landscape known as White Sands, where brilliant white gypsum dunes stretch across the horizon. Amidst this surreal desert environment, a remarkable evolutionary story unfolds—a story of adaptation, survival, and change. Here, the White Sands lizard has transformed over millennia, altering its very appearance to thrive ...

Could Volcanoes on Mars Still Be Active?

Could Volcanoes on Mars Still Be Active?

Gargi Chakravorty

The Red Planet has always held our fascination, but recent discoveries are shaking up everything we thought we knew about Mars. For decades, scientists assumed this dusty world was geologically dead, with its volcanic fires extinguished billions of years ago. However, mounting evidence from multiple NASA missions is painting a completely different picture. Mars might ...

From Mangroves to Monocultures: How Land Use Changes Affected Wildlife

From Mangroves to Monocultures: How Land Use Changes Affected Wildlife

Trizzy Orozco

As the sun casts its golden light over sprawling landscapes, the story of our planet’s transformation unfolds. From the rustling leaves of mangroves to the uniform rows of monocultures, the evolution of land use tells a tale of progress, conflict, and adaptation. This evolution has not only shaped the terrain but also the creatures that ...

Giant Groundsels: The Mountain’s Alien Sentinels

Living Fossils of the Highlands: The Evolutionary Secrets of Giant Groundsels

Trizzy Orozco

Imagine trekking through a cloud-veiled African mountain, the air crisp and thin, when suddenly you spot a plant that looks like it belongs in a lost era—giant, prehistoric, and almost otherworldly. This is no ordinary shrub. It’s a giant groundsel, a living relic that has silently watched the world change for millions of years. These ...