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A firestorm of speculation has been generated by a notice from NASA announcing a major discovery in the field of astrobiology, to be released today at 2 p.m. According to […]

A new bioplastic made from switchgrass is durable, capable of withstanding high temperatures, and, most importantly, biodegradable. Could this technology placate critics of corn-based alternatives?

‘Tis the season to be reading!In a sweeping panoramic new book titled The World in 2050: Four Forces Shaping Civilization’s Northern Future, UCLA professor Laurence C. Smith delivers a well-written and […]

Friday December 17 marked the one year anniversary of the US air strikes in Majalla, which killed, along with some al-Qaeda operatives, a number of women and children. The incident […]

Veteran Waq al-Waq readers can probably skip this post, as it reiterates things we’ve been saying on the blog for about a year now (and to our incredibly lucky family […]

As evidenced by the Copenhagen Conference, global action is not going to stop climate change. The world needs to look harder at how to live with it, says The Economist.

Forget slashing tires. You can trick a cheating ex into thinking he has an STD…or worse. Lucy Knight on the strange, and often murky, market for cybervengeance.

Al-Tagheer and other news outlets are reporting that the head of the Central Security Forces in al-Jawf, Ali Zayad survived an assassination attempt on Monday. The government is blaming the […]

Did a cheeky Ozzy intern change this map as a nod to his separatist mates back home?

Can and should we try to drill deep into the earth, past the crust and into the mantle? We’ve tried in the past but haven’t gotten far. If the earth was an orange, we’d have barely zested it.

So I’ve been battling a cold the last few days, and have been losing. You know- foggy, can’t think straight, haven’t had the energy to blog. So imagine, if you […]

Now that AGU is behind us and that I’ve waded through a lot of grading (over the weekend: 4 sets of labs and one each of papers and homework), I […]

One of the biggest problems I find in the coverage of geologic events in the media is the relationship between cause and effect. Many times the confusion of what factors […]

It has been just under a month since I made the decision to drastically reduce my posts – one a month, or so – and while I’m still trying to […]

SETI’s search for extraterrestrial life has failed for decades. A likely reason might be they are looking for aliens who look like your neighbors at twilight.

Six months ago, in late April, Research teams at the NASA Infrared Telescope facility in Hawaii made an astonishing discovery. They found that both water ice and organic compounds exist […]

Sustainable farming is a topic of pressing interest and a domain of growing innovation in agriculture, but it’s an incredibly complex issue involving multiple interrelated factors. A new partnership between […]

The DREAM Act sends the message that although American immigration law in effect tries to make water run uphill, we are not monsters, says the Democracy in America blog.

In honor of New Orleans I will share with you a drink passed on from Blake – someone I met when I was down there, I give you the Sazarac. […]

The anti-plastic crusade of the past few years has focused largely on bottled water, but the beverage market isn’t the only culprit for the plastic bottle epidemic. Replenish aims to […]

Waq al-waq has a very narrow, if self-delineated, portfolio: Yemen. But sometimes Yemen has some strange links, as some of the Google searches that bring people to Waq al-waq indicate. […]

Here’s an interesting event taking place tomorrow as bloggers across the world collectively focus on the topic of water.  Watch the video below and go to the Blog Action site […]

Ocean pollution has been a topic of increasing concern lately and its devastating aftermath for marine life has been grimly documented. To raise awareness about the issue, Electrolux has introduced […]

Lots of things going on the planet right now concerning volcanoes, but many don’t have a lot of information to go with the news. I’ll try to fill in as […]

Like the banshee of Irish and Scottish legend, Scottish artist Susan Philipsz keens songs of lamentation and loss that haunt those within hearing of the “sound sculptures” centered on her […]

This then is the sequence of events that has deeply alarmed the international community, fearful as it now is that full scale war could break out at anytime across the […]

There are a couple brief articles that an eruption has occurred near the border region of Cameroon and Nigeria – in the state of Benue, which is midway along of […]

Waters tells about some of his favorite bars, including those rare gay bars that play rap music. “Rap music, for some reason, really alienates gay people, which makes me laugh.”

A year ago I wrote a piece in the National entitled “Yemen’s Coming Power Struggle.”* Much of the article focuses on what I saw then as the coming battle between […]

Here it is, the answers to your volcanic questions for Dr. Clive Oppenheimer. His new book, Eruptions that Shook the World, comes out this week and I’ll have a review […]