Skip to main content

Subscribe to Smithsonian magazine and get a FREE tote.

Science / Our Planet

The aptly-named town of Coldfoot

Arctic Dispatch: A Toolik Farewell

After leaving Toolik, the team finds points of interest on the road back to Fairbanks

None

Arctic Dispatch: Looking at the Lakes

Alaska’s Arctic lakes are a source of methane experiments for a warming planet

Grand Canyons of Ice

The always-popular sauna in Toolik

Arctic Dispatch: The Toolik Way of Life

Gourmet fare, live music and 24-hour Arctic summer sun make life in Toolik hard to beat

On the drive from Toolik, a view of the ocean and sun in the early morning hours

Arctic Dispatch: A Polar Bear Plunge

A trip to the oil-rich Prudhoe Bay region ends in an Arctic swim

Marine Biological Laboratory research assistant Rich McHorney gets a sample core from the permafrost.

Arctic Dispatch: Thermokarst and Toolik

The team studies consequences of the Arctic’s warming temperatures

The team collects invertebrates from a heavily silted stream.

Arctic Dispatch: Exploring the Aufeis

Dell’Amore and her fellow researchers climb the aufeis and meet interesting insects

A view from the Jade Mountain summit

Arctic Dispatch: The Hike Up Jade Mountain

After a day of experiments and ongoing mosquito battles, Christine Dell’Amore enjoys the view from the top

The team hikes to the research sites above Toolik Lake.

Arctic Dispatch: Playing With Permafrost

The first field tests in the tundra look at the effects of nitrogen levels on permafrost

Toolik Field Station is located north of the Arctic Circle.

Arctic Dispatch: Reaching Toolik

Journalist Christine Dell’Amore travels to Alaska’s Toolik Field to observe the environmental changes occurring in the Arctic Circle

None

Wallace Broecker Geochemist, Palisades, New York

How to stop global warming? CO2 “scrubbers,” a new book says

The Hoover Dam in 1933

Excessive Withholding

Bottles washed up on a beach

The Trouble with Bottled Water

Elizabeth Royte reflects on the backlash against commercializing a natural resource and responds to reader comments

None

Q&A - Ed Begley, Jr.

Actor and environmental activist Ed Begley, Jr. talks about living green

Separated from his pod along the Pacific Coast, Luna befriended the people of remote Nootka Sound on the western shore of Canada’s Vancouver Island.

Befriending Luna the Killer Whale

How a popular Smithsonian story about a stranded orca led to a new documentary about humanity’s link to wild animals

Carbon Blob Eats US!

What can you do to reduce water consumption?

A schematic of modern thermohaline circulation.

Expand Your Eco-Influence

What can you do to reduce water consumption?

Page 93 of 106