Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

Dr. Jessica N. Cross @jessicancross.bsky.social · 17h

I will cook the admittedly prolific tops into stock for soup; and I will definitely eat these like snack food. The hard part will be keeping them around for very long. They’re quite sweet.

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Dr. Jessica N. Cross @jessicancross.bsky.social · 17h

A list of things that feel bigger than the carrots I grew from April-October this year: 🌱
—Popcorn Shrimp
—Egg noodles
—Pretzel sticks
—Bottle caps
—Coffee Beans
—Peppercorns
—Poppy seeds
—The Sisyphean inevitability that I will try to grow things in bad light and dry soil next year

Pygmy witch’s toe tiny ass carrots that had a huge deep bed and fertilizer and water and love and care and conversational encouragement and still did not grow bigger than my pinkie finger.

Red dishtowel in background.

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Dr. Jessica N. Cross @jessicancross.bsky.social · 1d

“We should focus on creating rules to find & fund the relatively few types of high-quality projects while employing alternative finance & strategies such as contribution claims for critical projects in conservation, renewable energy, & sustainable development.”

www.annualreviews.org/content/jour...

Are Carbon Offsets Fixable?

This article provides a systematic review of the literature on carbon offsets. A growing number of studies have found that the most widely used offset programs continue to greatly overestimate their p...

www.annualreviews.org

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Reposted by Dr. Jessica N. Cross

Stephanie Arcusa @sarcusa.bsky.social · 2d

I am pleased to share the publication of my newest paper with Dr. Lackner. All carbon sequestration has durability, a storage duration that varies by storage type. There is also a social decision for permanence, or how long is long enough. We explore why it matters and what it means buff.ly/UCoRzSd

Carbon sequestration ought to be permanent on climate-relevant timescales

Markets for durable carbon removal credits are expanding despite conflicting rules and standards. A major unresolved issue surrounds the permanence of…

buff.ly

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Reposted by Dr. Jessica N. Cross

Prof Helen Bostock @oceanhelen.bsky.social · 2d

📣Calling all Pacific early career researchers📣

Want to gain experience working, living and conducting science at sea while exploring key issues affecting your region? 🚢🌊.

Applications for the Floating University 2026 voyage. ⏰Applications open until 30 November.

Apply here 👉 bit.ly/4nXODH6

Microsoft Forms

bit.ly

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Reposted by Dr. Jessica N. Cross

Prof Helen Bostock @oceanhelen.bsky.social · 2d

PhD scholarship ay the University of Queensland to work on coastal nutrient pollution with Dr Leslie Huang. 🌊🧪

Major hidden source of land-based nutrients affecting Australian estuaries

study.uq.edu.au

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Reposted by Dr. Jessica N. Cross

Patrick Rafter @oceanandclimate.bsky.social · 5d

Today, we published a study long in the making on how upper and subsurface tropical Pacific waters responded (and maybe will adjust) to warmer global climate. Here’s the story of how we got here after 15 years. many authors but shout out @jfarmersalmanac.bsky.social
🌊
www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

Persistent eastern equatorial Pacific Ocean upwelling since the warm Pliocene

Upwelling generates a nutrient-rich “cold tongue” in the eastern equatorial Pacific Ocean (EEP), with impacts on global climate, oceanic biological productivity, and the carbon cycle. The cold tongue ...

www.science.org

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Reposted by Dr. Jessica N. Cross

George Matsumoto @georgeimatsumoto.bsky.social · 3d

🧪📍🌊 🦑🍎 The 2026 Hollings scholarship is now open until 1/31/26. During the U.S. Govt shutdown, the application will remain open, but staff are unavailable to answer questions or provide assistance. Learn more about the program and check out our resources for applicants: lnkd.in/eE2rfbr7

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Reposted by Dr. Jessica N. Cross

Angelo Villagomez @taotaotasi.bsky.social · 4d

There are three ocean themed MLB teams and I feel like ocean conservation professionals should care more about this

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Reposted by Dr. Jessica N. Cross

Jelena Godrijan 🫧❾🌊🦋 @godi.bsky.social · 6d

🌊🔬 Looking for a postdoc to join our team!
Cocco-Channel project ➡️ studying coccolithophore phycospheres and their role in ocean carbon cycling.
✔️ Plus if you bring experience in microbial ecology, molecular/microscopy tools & fieldwork
👉 More info: euraxess.ec.europa.eu/jobs/375178
#protistsonsky

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Reposted by Dr. Jessica N. Cross

Ocean Acidification Research Center @uaf-oarc-alaska.bsky.social · 9d

#OceanAcidification Week is October 13-17, 2025
This virtual, multi-day forum highlights OA knowledge from around the world. 🧪🌊🦑🌐 #OAWeek2025

Register for virtual events ⬇️
www.goa-on.org/webinars/OaW...

GOA-ON : OA Week

Welcome to GOA-ON, the Global Ocean Acidification Observing Network

www.goa-on.org

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Reposted by Dr. Jessica N. Cross

Dr. Kakani Katija @kakanikatija.bsky.social · 10d

This resonates.

Quistote @kquist.bsky.social · 10d

Ta-Nehisi Coates dropping such a beautiful articulation of a sense of #history and struggle that, I think, minority communities understand way more than, say, your average white American.

"I will make the contribution that I am supposed to make."

Write that on my classroom wall. 🗺️

I’m Ta-Nehisi Coates, I’m the writer, I’m the individual, right? But I am part of something larger, and I’ve always felt myself as part of something larger. I have a tradition, I have ancestry, I have heritage. What that means is that I do whatever I do within the time that I have in my life, whatever time I’m gifted with, and much of what I do is built on what other people did before them.

Then, after that, I leave the struggle where I leave it, and hopefully, it’s in a better place. Oftentimes it’s not. That’s the history in fact. And then my progeny, they pick it up, and they keep it going.

I am descended from people who, in their lifetime, fought with all their might for the destruction of chattel slavery in this country. And they never saw it. They never saw it. In my personal belief system, they died in defeat, in darkness.

So I guess the privilege that I draw out of this, the honor that I draw out of this, is not that things will necessarily be better in my lifetime, but that I will make the contribution that I am supposed to make.

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Reposted by Dr. Jessica N. Cross

Joshua Basseches @joshuabasseches.bsky.social · 10d

This is the way.
heatmap.news/politics/ene...

Democrats Bid to Become the Party of Cheap Energy: Exclusive

Representatives Sean Casten and Mike Levin have a new package of legislation designed to lower electricity prices — in a way that just so happens to be “clean.”

heatmap.news

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Dr. Jessica N. Cross @jessicancross.bsky.social · 11d

New mCDR papers this month:

www.frontiersin.org/journals/cli...

www.frontiersin.org/journals/env...

Frontiers | Regional ocean biogeochemical modeling challenges for predicting the effectiveness of marine carbon dioxide removal

Effectively scaling diverse marine carbon dioxide removal (mCDR) technologies from pilot-scale demonstrations to industrial-scale deployments requires a quan...

www.frontiersin.org

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Reposted by Dr. Jessica N. Cross

Justin Gerdes @justingerdes.bsky.social · 13d

"It saves us money, and will continue to save us money,” Steve Fate, president of the West Union District Energy geothermal network in downtown West Union, Iowa, told @mckennapr.bsky.social: insideclimatenews.org/news/2009202... 🔌💡

This Town Was One of the First in the Nation to Install a Geothermal Network. Now Others Are Warming Up to the Idea. - Inside Climate News

More than a decade after West Union, Iowa, tapped geothermal energy, the town’s heating and cooling network is a “celebrity” among clean energy advocates.

insideclimatenews.org

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Reposted by Dr. Jessica N. Cross

Lauri Myllyvirta @laurimyllyvirta.bsky.social · 13d

My reading is that this is a set of targets prepared by a conservative bureaucracy that Xi did not choose to override this time. It should be seen as a floor, not a ceiling, for China's ambition.

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Reposted by Dr. Jessica N. Cross

Grist @grist.org · 14d

The weirdest ways scientists are mining for critical minerals, from water to weeds.

Not all critical minerals need to come from digging up the earth.

grist.org/energy/the-w...

#Minerals #Water #Weeds #Science #Scientists #Mining #Environment #Climate

The weirdest ways scientists are mining for critical minerals, from water to weeds

Not all critical minerals need to come from digging up the earth.

grist.org

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Reposted by Dr. Jessica N. Cross

depths of wikipedia @depthsofwikipedia.bsky.social · 15d

imagine if a family of beavers randomly showed up right now and finished whatever thing you've been putting off

In early 2025, beaver activity in the Brdy Protected Landscape Area, Czech Republic, contributed to the restoration of a wetland ecosystem. A family of beavers constructed a series of dams that coincidentally accomplished environmental goals of the Czech government, which had delayed its proposed project since 2018 for bureaucratic and financial reasons. The beaver-built dams saved the Czech government approximately US$1.2 million,

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Reposted by Dr. Jessica N. Cross

Dr. Jessica N. Cross @jessicancross.bsky.social · Jul 18

Long Live The Wørd. 🖊️🗡️ 👑 ✊

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Dr. Jessica N. Cross @jessicancross.bsky.social · 19d

MORE CAT: There is no such thing as fake flowers, human. I do not bask in nature, I bask in myself. I am Cat. There is only Cat. #morecat #timelinecleanse

Posh gray tabby cat on a heated brown cushion in front of a Lego Orchid. Framed degrees in the background. This loser looks posh and well educated and sounds very sage when he stares at me with this “there is only cat” business but BE NOT FOOLED, I SAY: this dummy shreds postit pads and eats the confetti and then barfs on the floor of my office during meetings. (Yes, we do Play and have walks and do all the things to keep him from getting bored and shredding paper and sometimes he just does it anyway. I think it’s schadenfreude but he would probably say it’s something like “joy in chaos” or “only cat”)

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Dr. Jessica N. Cross @jessicancross.bsky.social · Sep 5

Ice Jams Dam in Brash Sea Plan

Paul Voosen @voosen.me · Sep 5

My latest looks at an audacious new geoengineering proposal: Damming the Bering Strait to save the Atlantic's overturning circulation from collapse.

It would bring all the ecological, social, and political problems -- and it could cause the collapse it's trying to forestall. (Or not.)

Could a giant dam save the Atlantic currents that keep Europe warm?

Geoengineering scheme that would block the Bering Strait could kill the ocean circulation it’s meant to protect, researchers warn

www.science.org

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Reposted by Dr. Jessica N. Cross

Mike Tyka @mtyka.bsky.social · Sep 4

Our new paper with Mengyang Zhou, Elizabeth Yankovsky, and Dustin Carroll is out as a preprint: egusphere.copernicus.org/preprints/20... "Substantial inter-model variation in OAE efficiency between the CESM2/MARBL and ECCO-Darwin ocean biogeochemistry models"

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Reposted by Dr. Jessica N. Cross

Zia Weise @ziaweise.bsky.social · Sep 1

🚨 Scoop (now free to read): The carbon credits clause in the EU's 2040 climate target could see the bloc offshore emissions cuts exceeding the annual emissions of France & Belgium.

Leaked doc shows scale of offsetting plan for 1st time.

w/ @l-guillot.bsky.social

www.politico.eu/article/euro...

EU weighs outsourcing France-sized chunk of emissions cuts to poorer nations

A leaked EU document reveals the scale of Brussels’ plan to offset its climate efforts.

www.politico.eu

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Reposted by Dr. Jessica N. Cross

Nick Sousanis @nsousanis.bsky.social · Aug 24

My statement on Ai from the mini-comic as syllabus i made for new class I'm teaching that starts tomorrow! It robs you of your decisions & struggles - and the joy of being surprised. We won’t to be robbed of our learning - this is essential. This & the full mini at post:
bsky.app/profile/nsou...

a snippet of a mini-comic, at top - straight line stretches from point A to B. Immediately below, same dot at A, then becomes a curving, meandering line that winds through the page and ends at a point with rays and a question mark emanating from it. Text reads: "Nothing can do this for you - for that robs you of experience and conflates answers with learning. Rather, it's all the decisions you make along the way, the mistakes, struggles, and surprises! These pathways you create - this is learning.

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Dr. Jessica N. Cross @jessicancross.bsky.social · Aug 29

Team ikaite, because it forms in sea ice brine and I spent time in a very deep rabbit hole in grad school. #mincup25

Mineral Cup #MinCup25 @mineralcup.bsky.social · Aug 29

Behold, the #MinCup35 bracket!

Use it to follow along, plan campaigns to support your favs, or make predictions on how voting will shake out. We start at the top left on September 1st, then alternate left and right as we work our way down.

A sports-style elimination bracket of 32 minerals labeled "Mineral Cup 2025". Text below reads, "Daily voting takes place on www.MineralCup.org in September. Campaign on your favorite social media using #MinCup25."

The starting matches are, in chronological order: chrysotile versus pectolite, stibnite versus okenite, jeremejevite versus haüyne, calcite versus perovskite, silver versus baryte, carpathite versus leucite, sanidine versus hematite, pollucite versus tugtupite, kosmochlor versus azurite, dioptase versus wavellite, titanite versus thortveitite, zunyite versus molybdenite, topaz versus kyanite, cuprosklodowskite versus ikaite, taenite versus nontronite, and paddlewheelite versus mannardite.

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