Written by Ellen Gray
NASA’s Earth Science News Team
Washington, D.C. – New NASA-funded research has discovered that Arctic permafrost’s expected gradual thawing and the associated release of greenhouse gases to the atmosphere may actually be sped up by instances of a relatively little known process called abrupt thawing. Abrupt thawing takes place under a certain type of Arctic lake, known as a thermokarst lake that forms as permafrost thaws.
The impact on the climate may mean an influx of permafrost-derived methane into the atmosphere in the mid-21st century, which is not currently accounted for in climate projections.
 Methane bubbles up from the thawed permafrost at the bottom of the thermokarst lake through the ice at its surface. (Katey Walter Anthony/ University of Alaska Fairbanks)
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NASA successfully launched Sounding Rocket into the Alaskan Sky
January 30, 2017 |
Written by Keith Koehler
NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility
Wallops Island, VA – An experiment to measure nitric oxide in the polar sky was successfully launched on a NASA sounding rocket at 8:45am EST, January 27th, 2017, from the Poker Flat Research Range in Alaska.
The Polar Night Nitric Oxide experiment or PolarNOx was launched on a Black Brant IX sounding rocket to an altitude of nearly 176 miles. Preliminary information shows that good data was collected.
 NASA Sounding Rocket launching from the Poker Flat Research Range in Alaska. (NASA/Jamie Adkins)
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NASA researchers using Air Campaigns to study Arctic Climate
September 21, 2014 |
Written by Alan Buis
NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory
Pasadena, CA – Over the past few decades, average global temperatures have been on the rise, and this warming is happening two to three times faster in the Arctic. As the region’s summer comes to a close, NASA is hard at work studying how rising temperatures are affecting the Arctic.
NASA researchers this summer and fall are carrying out three Alaska-based airborne research campaigns aimed at measuring greenhouse gas concentrations near Earth’s surface, monitoring Alaskan glaciers, and collecting data on Arctic sea ice and clouds. Observations from these NASA campaigns will give researchers a better understanding of how the Arctic is responding to rising temperatures.
 Changes in more than 130 Alaskan glaciers are being surveyed by scientists at the University of Alaska-Fairbanks in a DHC-3 Otter as part of NASA’s multi-year Operation IceBridge. (Chris Larsen, University of Alaska-Fairbanks)
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Instant Peay Play: New Era starts today for Austin Peay State University as new President officially assumes duties
Clarksville, TN – In the history, or timeline, of any university there are mileposts that dot the progress of that institution over the years and Austin Peay State University is no different.
One of those events will occur June 30th, as Alisa White will assume the leadership role of president of the university – taking over for Tim Hall, who served in that capacity the past seven years.
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