Forests in the eastern United States have undergone a radical transformation since the time before European colonization, a new study suggests.

By comparing modern forest composition throughout nine states, across a region from Maine to Pennsylvania, with land-survey records that describe those forests during pre-colonial times, researchers from the Smithsonian Institution found that while the species and variety of trees are mostly same, their distribution and numbers are very different from 400 years ago.

"The modern forest is compositionally distinct from the pre-colonial condition," scientists write in a paper published on Wednesday, Sept. 4 in the journal PLOS One.

Most of that change is the result of intensive logging and agricultural clearing that began around 1650 and continued for the next two centuries. These cleared areas then naturally reforested as trees moved back in.

Additionally, researchers found that modern forests are more homogeneous and their composition isn't as affected by local environmental factors, like precipitation, temperature, and elevation. Despite geographic distance, the forest composition between "any two towns, on average, is slightly more similar in the modern era than it was in the colonial period," according to the study. 

The graphic below shows how forest composition has changed over the last four centuries. Beech, oak, hemlock, and spruce are much less abundant today, while fir, cherry, and maple trees have increased since pre-colonial times. American chestnut trees were almost completely wiped out in the early 20th century due to an invasive fungal blight that persists today.

You can see how different the forests are:

Across the region, beech trees — large deciduous trees distinguished by smooth, grey bark — experienced the largest decline in abundance, dropping from an average of 22% in pre-colonial times to 7% today. The most noticeable changes are in Vermont, western Massachusetts, and northern Pennsylvania. Beech abundance remained the same in the Adirondack Mountains of New York, according to the study.

Oak trees underwent substantial declines in abundance, from 18% in the pre-colonial era to 11% in modern forests. Oak declines were most pronounced in central Massachusetts and southwestern Pennsylvania.

Hemlock trees declined from 11% in pre-colonial times to 7% in modern times.

Maples experienced the biggest absolute change in relative abundance and now dominate the northeastern U.S., increasing throughout the region from an average of 11% in the past to 31% today.

A view of the Swift River Valley in Central Massachusetts, photographed in 1890, shows extensive forest clearing for agriculture.

The same view photographed today shows the recovery that forests have made in many parts of the Northeastern U.S.

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An underwater volcano in the Pacific Ocean may be the largest on Earth, according to a new study published on Thursday in the journal Nature Geoscience.

Tamu Massif is the largest of three giant mounds that stick up from the Shatsky Rise, a giant ocean plateau in the northwest Pacific, about 1,000 miles east of Japan. Tamu stands for Texas A&M University, where lead author of the study William Sager first began studying the volcano 20 years ago before joining the University of Houston.

The underwater volcano covers an area of about 120,000 square miles, or an area about the size of New Mexico. That's 60 times the size of the world's largest active volcano, Mauna Loa in Hawaii, and comparable in size to the largest volcano in the solar system, Olympus Mons on Mars, according to the study.

The volcano is very wide, spreading out across the ocean floor, but not that tall. The slopes are so gradual that "if you were standing on its flank, you would have trouble telling which way is downhill," Sager said in a statement.

According to Sager, "Tamu Massif is believed to be about 145 million years old, and it became inactive within a few million years after it was formed."

PHOTOS: Here's The Hard Work That Goes Into Catching Your Lobster

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In case you need a reason to get excited for winter, or to buy a monkey. 

Watch the video below, courtesy of cheezburger.com:

SEE ALSO: 25 Things That Make You Happier

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Lola the lobster doesn't look like other crustaceans of her kind. She has six claws — one normal claw on her right side and five claws on the other side. The deformed claw kind of looks like a hand.

"I have never seen one quite like this before," Aimee Hayden-Roderiques, manager at the Maine State Aquarium where Lola is on display, said in an e-mail.

The 4-pound lobster was caught by fishermen off the coast of Hyannis in Massachusetts. She was brought to the aquarium last week and her exhibit tank is open for public viewing starting today until Sept. 29, when the aquarium closes for the season.

Claw abnormalities are typically the result of a genetic mutation. It's not clear if Lola was born this way or if it happened during regeneration after the claw was lost. (Lobsters can drop a claw if they are trapped or to escape danger, such as in a fight with another lobster. The claw with grow back after its next molt).

The lobster's meat should not be affected by the deformity, says Hayden-Roderiques. Lobster boil anyone?

PHOTOS: Here's The Hard Work That Goes Into Catching Your Lobster

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An unusual photo of an airborne frog in the foreground of NASA's latest spacecraft launch has now gone viral. 

The photo is authentic— it was taken by a still camera planted a few hundred feet away from the launch pad — but many are wondering what became of the frog. 

Zigmond Leszczynski, deputy executive director for the Virginia Commercial Space Flight Authority, which owns and operates the Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport where the rocket was launched, says he is hopeful that the frog survived. But no one can be sure. 

Before a launch, the team usually walks around the site to make sure there are no foreign objects or debris. "This frog must have been outside the perimeter at the time," Leszczynski told Business Insider in an email. "Launch pads are usually built in remote locations, which often have marshes that are home to frogs like the one in that photo."

So that we can all rest easy, someone has come up with a cute way to save the frog, which is hanging in mid-air just a few feet away from the location of the remote camera. 

In the animation, the frog pops open a life-saving mini parachute and is carried off the photograph to safety. We feel better now. 

Here's the animation from imgur:

SEE ALSO: The Best 3-D Map Of The Milky Way's Center Ever Created

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NASA confirmed on Thursday that Voyager 1 has finally reached interstellar space, the cold, dark region between solar systems. 

Voyager 1, launched by NASA in 1977, crossed into interstellar space on or about Aug. 25 2012, according to researchers who published their findings in the journal Science.  

At 12 billion miles from our sun, Voyager 1 is the first man-made object to venture into interstellar space.

Scientists know this because the plasma, or ionized gas, in interstellar space has higher density than solar plasma. The spacecraft has been traveling through this high-density interstellar plasma for about one year, according to NASA. 

In an artist's concept that shows the spacecraft entering interstellar space, the interstellar plasma is shown with an orange glow.  

"We're in a truly alien environment," Gary Zank, director of the Center for Space Plasma and Aeronomic Research at University of Alabama said in press conference. "The material we're in is not from the sun."

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Maine has more lobsters than it knows what to do with.

With catches more than double what they were a decade ago — due to more fishermen, fewer predators, warmer water, and good conservation— the industry is struggling with pricing pressure and distribution constraints. Processing is the best way to expand distribution, but it's an underdeveloped industry, currently dominated by the Canadians.

Shucks Maine Lobster, an innovative processor near Portland is looking to expand operations. Shucks is one of just 16 processors in the state, according to the company's president John Hathaway. It's the only place in the United States that uses water pressure rather than cooking to loosen the meat from the shell, allowing workers to extract the meat in one piece.

This processing method allows Shucks to sell packaged lobster in its raw form, producing a fresher meal for buyers around the country. Restaurants and supermarkets can use the product in lieu of live lobsters, which are expensive to ship and store. Individual consumers like the so-called "Lazy Man's Lobster" because they don't have to deal with the trauma and mess of boiling and shucking a live lobster.

It's an impressive product, but the local industry still faces obstacles. Building new processing plants won't be cheap, and Shucks' multimillion dollar high pressure processor is particularly expensive. Then there's the challenge of developing a new market.

"There's a huge demand for Maine lobster," Hathaway said. "Outside of New England there are 300 million people that would potentially buy lobster if it were delivered in a convenient way." The biggest obstacle, he added, "is distribution and opening up those channels from the East Coast to West Coast and in between."

We toured the Shucks plant for a closer look at this innovative technology.

Shucks Maine Lobster is found in Richmond, Maine, about 45 minutes from Portland.

The processing facility is located inside what used to be a golf shoe factory.

One of just 16 processing facilities in the state, Shucks can process up to 30,000 pounds of soft-shell lobsters each day.

Heavy rain and flash floods in Colorado have killed at least four, while thousands of others are being evacuated from their homes. 

In Boulder up to 10 inches of rain fell on the city in one night, flooding the area with around 4.5 billion gallons of water, according to the Denver Post. 

The chart below shows Boulder Creek's flow rate over the last month, peaking at around 4,500 cubic feet per second (cfs) in the last couple of days. That is 45 times greater than the typical flow rate of 100 to 300 cfs. One cubic foot per second is equal to roughly 7.5 gallons of water per second.

A U.S. Geological Survey spokesman told the Post that this is a "100-year-flood," meaning there is only a 1 in 100 chance that a flood of this magnitude will happen each year (it does not mean that they occur at 100-year intervals). 

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A giant molasses spill in Honolulu on Monday leaked 233,000 gallons of the sticky stuff into the harbor. 

The spill is being called the worst environmental disaster in Hawaii's history. The cracked pipe that caused the leak was repaired on Tuesday, but the spill has already killed thousands of fish and officials are warning swimmers and surfers to stay out of the water since it could attract sharks. 

“Everything is dead. They’re all dead and they’re all just lying across the bottom — hundreds and hundreds, thousands," a diver told  NBC affiliate KHNL.

The worst part is that nothing can be done to clean up the mess. 

Molasses is heavier than water, so unlike oil, it sinks to the bottom of the seafloor. 

"Unlike with an oil spill, it’s a sugar product so it will dissipate on its own," a spokesman for the shipping company that maintains the molasses pipeline told NBCNews. "There’s not an active cleanup."

Here are more photos from the disaster:

Various kinds of dead marine life can seen in this barrel collected by employees from the PENCO Pacific Environmental Corporation at a dock in Keehi Lagoon in Honolulu. 

Health officials have warned swimmers, surfers, and snorkelers in Hawaii to stay out of the waters near Honolulu. 

A dead fish washed ashore is seen in Keehi Lagoon. Thousands of fish have been killed. 

SEE ALSO: Maine Processor Has An Incredible Way Of Getting Lobster Out Of Its Shell

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Shucks Maine Lobster, a processor near Portland, uses a machine called the "Big Mother Shucker" to kill lobster in six seconds using high water pressure.

Here's how it works: Live lobsters are dumped into a cylindrical-shaped metal basket. The basket is lowered into a water-filled chamber where pumps crank up the pressure to around 40,000 pounds per square inch, more than twice the pressure of the deepest parts of the ocean. The lobsters die almost instantly, while the pressure causes the meat to detach from the shell. Before the lobsters come out of the machine, the pressure is increased to 87,000 pounds per square inch to kill off any bacteria or other pathogens. 

High pressure processing is used similarly in other industries to increase the shelf life of food. Although several Canadian processors use the high-pressure method to shuck lobsters, Shucks is the only place in the United States to use the multimillion dollar machine and sell frozen packaged lobster in its raw form.

The system has revolutionized how lobster meat is sold to consumers around the country, since previously the only way to get lobster out of its shell was by cooking it.

After going through the "Big Mother Shucker," the lobster can be removed from the shell in one solid piece, known as a "Naked Lobster":

SEE ALSO: See the Big Mother Shucker in action

SEE ALSO: See how lobsters are caught in Maine

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Floodwaters have ravaged a Connecticut-size area of Colorado, killing at least seven people, destroying thousands of homes, and blocking hundreds of roads and bridges.

Colorado's Front Range, a 415-square-mile expanse and gateway to Rocky Mountain National Park has been completely transformed by flooding, caused by unusually heavy showers over several days.

The aerial photos below so the extent of the damage and the long road ahead.

SEE ALSO: One Chart Shows How Horrendous The Flooding Is In Colorado

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People are more sensitive about killing lobsters than other animals.  

Few diners cringe at the thought of a fish slowly suffocating to death or being slaughtered on the deck of a boat, but there is considerable more stress associated with dropping Maine's icon into a pot of boiling water.

The Lobster Institute in Maine maintains that the lobster's primitive nervous system is most similar to the nervous system of an insect. Lobsters react to sudden stimulus, like twitching their tails when placed in boiling water, but they don't have complex brains that allow them to process pain like humans and other animals do. 

"Do you have the same concern when you kill a fly or a mosquito?" asks Robert Bayer, executive director of the Lobster Institute. "Cooking a lobster is like cooking a big bug."

Most consumers still don't see it that way. Lobsters inspire more compassion than chicken, pork, or other fish because it is one of the few foods that urbanites have to kill themselves when cooking.

The research on whether or not these creatures feel pain, however, is still inconclusive. 

Earlier this year, a scientist from Queen's University in Belfast argued that lobsters and other crustaceans probably do feel pain, on the grounds that crabs in a study learned to avoid a hideaway where they were repeatedly given an electric shock. A Norwegian study from 2005 concluded the opposite: lobsters do not have brains, so they do not feel pain. 

In 2006, Whole Foods banned the sale of live lobsters and crabs in its stores (with the exception of those in Maine) citing that transporting, storing, and cooking live animals was inhumane. A video released by PETA on Tuesday showing live lobsters being ripped apart by hand at a processor in Maine has again struck a chord with animal rights groups. 

We will never know how the lobster feels, which is why the Institute focuses on ways to cook lobster so that "it minimizes our own trauma," says Bayer. 

He suggests putting the lobster in either fresh cold water or chilling it in the freezer (without freezing it) before cooking. Both methods, according to Bayer, will "put the lobster to sleep." 

One Maine processor uses an 80,000-pound machine called the "Big Mother Shucker" to kill lobsters in just six seconds using high water pressure. 

Another option is the CrustaStun, a device that home chefs can purchase for several thousand dollars to "zap lobster's nervous system in one jolt," says Trevor Corson, author of "The Secret Life of Lobsters." 

A large kitchen knife will also make for a quick death when cooks hold the lobster upside down and slice it in half from the tail to the head. Corson provides step-by-step instructions for this method on his blog. 

As for the most humane way to kill a lobster, "there's no absolute answer," says Bayer. It's based on what we perceive as pain or perhaps hear as "screams," even if those sounds are just the steam escaping the lobster's shell. 

SEE ALSO: Maine Processor Has An Incredible Way Of Getting Lobster Out Of Its Shell

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The Rim Fire in Yosemite National Park has been raging for just over a month and has already burned more than 250,000 acres in California. Now 84% contained, it is already the third largest wildfire in California history and largest in the Sierra Nevada region.

Below is a stunning time-lapse video (when a series of photographs are sped up to show a change over time) of the wildfire by John Byers and the National Park Service.

The first third of the video shows the devastation the fire has wrought in the Crane Flat Helibase. Skip ahead to 1:52 to see a beautiful sunset view from the famous Yosemite Valley. You'll notice that the fire has left the valley untouched — don't cancel those family trips to Yosemite just yet.

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I'm obsessive with checking the weather. I'm also someone who will run to another weather application if my iPhone isn't showing good weather because I'm hopeful that it will be sunnier.

It sounds like a silly habit, but it also raises a good question: Why do weather forecasts vary depending on which app you use?

The forecast process starts with data and observations that come from weather stations around the world, satellites, radar, reports from volunteers, and weather balloons that collect information about the atmosphere, such as humidity, wind speed, and temperature.

All of these measurements are fed into supercomputers run by the United States government and other countries. The European Union is a major source of weather data, but the British, French, German, Japanese, Canadians, and Chinese all have their own models too.

Supercomputers take those initial conditions and then use mathematical equations to come up with a forecast. There's no perfect algorithm because the Earth is so big that's impossible to have observational data for every parcel of air.

"Algorithms make some assumptions about the atmosphere," said Chris Maier, a meteorologist at the National Weather Service. "The equations provide an estimate of where certain atmospheric conditions are going to be." 

Since each computer model uses a different mathematical formula, each weather forecast may be slightly different.  

The outputs, or "solutions" to the equations, are typically maps that show things like pressure, temperature, and precipitation in a certain geographic area. Supercomputers with more power will produce higher resolution maps, which means they are more accurate.  

"The forecast that you see on weather apps is based off one or a compilation of the model information," according to James West, senior meteorologist at WeatherBug. "The accuracy of weather apps depends on how each organization uses the data they are given." 

After you get the outputs, the meteorologists and their knowledge of the local weather patterns all come into play, Maier adds. 

Weather data is provided free by the U.S. government through agencies like the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Organization, making it relatively easy for anyone to develop a weather app. But that doesn't mean it will be good.

Organizations that get data from the government, but also from their own network of weather stations and proprietary computer systems, can take these models to generate their own forecasts.

In a situation where the weather is changing rapidly, such as during a blizzard or hurricane, "the organizations that have invested in technology will generally offer more frequent updates and more accuracy," according to West.

The forecast also depends on the experience of the meteorologist and how he or she interprets the models. There are models that are better at handling certain weather events (i.e hurricanes or snowstorms), models that are better designed for long-term or short-term forecasting, and models that are known to be less accurate. It's the meteorologist's job to know the reputation of each model and adjust and improve the forecast based on this knowledge.

Ultimately, there's variation that comes from the different supercomputers, and then organizations have their own formulas and meteorologists that adjust those forecasts further.

SEE ALSO: Maine Processor Has An Incredible Way Of Getting Lobster Out Of Its Shell

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Typhoon Usagi, the worst storm to hit the Western Pacific this year, is expected to skirt within 62 miles to the north of Hong Kong between Sunday night and Monday morning, according to the latest update from the Hong Kong Observatory. 

Two people were killed in the Philippines and nine people were hurt in Taiwan when the powerful storm hit the island communities on Saturday, according to the AP. 

On Sunday, visitors took pictures of tidal waves created by the severe typhoon in Hangzhou in Zhejiang province, about 665 miles northeast of Hong Kong. 

SEE ALSO: Astonishing Aerial Photos Of The Colorado Flooding

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Many Arctic hybrids have already been seen in the wild.

In 2006, a white bear with brown splotches, believed to be a hybrid of a polar bear and a grizzly, was shot by Arctic hunters. Then in 2009, a possible hybrid of a right whale and a bowhead was photographed in the Bering Sea.

The increased hybridization of animals is a strong indication that our climate is changing. As Arctic sea ice continues to melt at drastic rates, different species of seals, whales, and bears previously blocked by huge slabs of ice will begin mingling in the same regions and possibly mating.

Hybrid animals are generally infertile. But the trend is worrisome because it could drive certain species to extinction since those animals are no longer mating with their own kind.

A study published in the journal Nature in 2010 listed 34 species that are at risk of cross-breeding because of a warming climate.

We asked artist Nickolay Lamm to help us imagine what some of those hybrid animals would like if they came to life. 

Elin Pierce, a writer and editor with a Ph.D. in biology, helped to hypothesize what features the hybrid animals would have, based on dominant features of the original two species, and any descriptions or photos of those hybrids that already exist in the wild.

A beluga whale is on the left and narwhal is on the right.

This is a beluga-narwhal hybrid. In this artist's interpretation, the hybrid has some narwhal coloring and the forehead has less of a bump. In the late 1980s, a whale skull thought to be that of a beluga-narwhal mix was found in west Greenland. Local hunters say they have also spotted the hybrid.

A polar bear is on the left and a grizzly bear is on the right.

Biologist Robert Hanlon studies how cephalopods, a group of marine animals that includes octopus, squid, and cuttlefish, blend into their surroundings by changing the color and pattern of their skin.

Hanlon captured a particularly incredible example of an octopus going in and out of camouflage while diving in the Caribbean. The video was first posted to Science Friday last August.

Here's how Hanlon described the moment to NPR's multimedia editor Flora Lichtman:

Well, the scene is this: diving along a shallow coral reef in the Caribbean and there's a rock sitting out in a sand plain, all by itself, and it's just looks like a plain, boring rock. And as the video comes a little bit closer to the rock, suddenly, one-third of it turns into a bright white octopus that has been beautifully camouflaged, and suddenly goes out of the camouflage because the cameramen are so close and then it inks in the face and swims off. So you - it really was - I think I yelled wow at the moment of...

Check out the exciting moment in the GIF below:

And here's the full video:

SEE ALSO:  These Hybrid Animals Will Be Created Because Of Climate Change

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A digital camera trap captured the first photo of a golden eagle attacking a young sika deer in southern Russia.

The camera trap was originally set up by Linda Kerley of the Zoological Society of London and Jonathan Slaght of the Wildlife Conservation Society to photograph Siberian tigers.

In December 2011 the camera trap captured three images, spanning a period of 2 seconds, of an adult golden eagle grabbing onto the back of a six- to seven-month-old sika deer. Full-grown golden eagles can weigh up to 14 pounds, while the study's authors estimate that the deer weighed between 88 and 110 pounds.  

A fourth image shows the deer's carcass, found by Kerley two weeks after the incident when she was checking up on the camera. The deer appeared to have fallen during the attack and died in the same place. All that remained was the hide and skeleton indicating that other scavengers had dropped by to pick at the body. 

The photos, shown below, were published in the Journal of Raptor Research.

There are many documented accounts of golden eagles attacking and killing large mammals, including other species of deer, livestock, mountain goats, and even a brown bear cub, according to the study.

But this is the first time, in more than a decade of studying deer deaths in Russia, that Kerley has seen any deer killed by a golden eagle. 

The authors point out that this is not a common occurrence and there is no evidence that these attacks have an impact on Russia's deer population. But the photos are amazing. 

SEE ALSO: These Hybrid Animals Will Be Created Because Of Climate Change

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Instructors at the Catalina Marine Institute (CIMI) found the carcass of a rare, 18-foot-long oarfish on Sunday afternoon. It was discovered in Toyon Bay on Catalina Island off the coast of California.

The fish appeared to have died from natural causes and its body was "almost perfectly intact," according a news release from CIMI. This is likely because it hadn't been dead long.

The oarfish is the longest known bony fish in the world, though it is rarely observed, especially alive.

In June, scientists released a video of an apparently healthy 8-foot long oarfish swimming in the Gulf of Mexico. This was the first time the animal had ever been caught on video alive in its natural habitat. 

The oarfish lives in deep waters (they can dive down to over 3,000 feet), which makes them hard to study.

In a news realease, the longest-serving CIMI employee said: “In 32 years here, I have never seen anything like this!"

It took 15 adults to haul the silvery fish out of the water and up to the beach. The CIMI staff hasn't decided what to do with the dead fish yet, according KTLA in Los Angeles, but they have been in touch with at least two museums in southern California.

SEE ALSO: 18 Stunning Pictures Of Yellowstone National Park

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On Wednesday, Russian divers recovered from a frozen lake the largest-known chunk of what's believed to be from the meteor that exploded over the Russian city of Chelyabinsky in February.

The tiny asteroid, which entered Earth's atmosphere weighing around 11,000 tons, burst into small pieces as it burned up, producing a shock wave on the ground that shattered windows and injured more than 1,000 people from flying glass, while raining down fragments of rock across a 60-mile long region.

Most fragments of the meteor — know as meteorites once they hit the ground — were believed to have sunk to the bottom of Lake Chebarkul, a frozen lake in the Chelyabinsky region. Recovery workers initially turned up empty-handed.

The rock that was just pulled from the Russian lake was found at the beginning of September. After it was dragged from the water, it measured five-feet long, and weighed around 1,255 pounds before splitting into three pieces and breaking the scale that it was being weighed on, according to the AFP.

Scientists still need to verify that the hunk of rock came from space and was actually part of the Chelyabinsky meteor, although many features — like fractures and a crust that indicates it survived the heat of passing through Earth's atmosphere — suggest that it is a true meteorite. A small sample will be X-rayed to determine its mineral composition, according to RT.

Over 12 pieces of rock have been pulled from Lake Chebarkul since the meteor explosion, but only one-third of those turned out to be real meteorites, according to the AFP.

PHOTOS: Crazy Images From The Meteor That Exploded Over Russia

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