Undersea Earthquakes Shake Up Climate Science

Researchers show how they are able to make use of existing seismic monitoring equipment, as well as historic seismic data, to determine how much the temperature of the earth's oceans has changed and continues changing, even at depths that are normally out of the reach of conventional tools. They do this by listening for the sounds from the many earthquakes that regularly occur under the ocean, says Joern Callies, Assistant Professor of Environmental Science and Engineering. Callies says these earthquake sounds are powerful and travel long distances through the ocean without significantly weakening, which makes them easy to monitor. [Caltech story]