Beautiful photos of the Mexican Temple of Santiago have been circulating online, showing the church reappear from the water like a lost ruin of Atlantis.

The Grijalva river in Chiapas, Mexico has been suffering from a drought over the past year which has caused the water level in Nezahualcoyotl reservoir to decrease by 25 meters (82 feet).

The "silver lining" of this drought has been another chance to see this snapshot of history which was thought to be lost to a watery grave.

The church is said to have been built by a group of monks led by Friar Bartolome de la Casas, who arrived in the area with Spanish settlers around the mid-16th century.

The church was abandoned between 1773 to 1776 due to massive plagues sweeping the area, according to architect Carlos Navarete, who worked on a report about the structure.

Epidemics were common in the Americas from the late 15th century, when explorers, settlers and traders introduced bacteria and viruses to the New World.

When the nearby dam was completed in 1966, the church was flooded and left unseen for almost 40 years. 

However, an even more severe drought caused the church to pop out of the water in 2002. The water levels were so low that people were even able to walk around the church. Speaking to Associated Press, local fisherman Leonel Mendoza said, "The people celebrated. They came to eat, to hang out, to do business. I sold them fried fish. They did processions around the church."

Over the past few days, fishermen have been giving people trips out on their boats to let them explore the ruins themselves while they are exposed.

SEE ALSO: 19 photos that show life around the world in the hottest month ever recorded

CHECK OUT: Giant, ancient viruses thawing out in Siberia are changing everything we thought we knew about them

Join the conversation about this story »

NOW WATCH: A devastating look at the California drought

“One of the many focuses in the John’s Lab at the City College of New York is to clean up oil spills using chemicals made from renewable resources like fruits and oil.

First we do a bit of good old organic chemistry and link fatty acids from edible oils and sugars from raspberries or monkfruits. This creates what we call an ester, a bond strong enough for the applications to come, but not too strong.

We do this using nature’s most efficacious workers (enzymes) to speed things up and make a product that will easily break down after it’s done being used.

Here, not only is the product environmentally friendly, but so too is the low energy catalytic process which we use to make it.

Next, we do a little supramolecular chemistry, or to put it another way: Lego with molecules. Because the forces between the molecules we make are so specifically tuned, they are capable of stacking like the bricks into long strings in solution, which then entangle like a sponge to form a gel and trap liquid around it.

While most gels are used to trap water (like Jello), these gels because of their composition are best at turning water-fearing, or apolar liquids into gels. Examples of such liquids include cooking oils for trans-fats replacements, hydrocarbons for next-generation fuels which don’t spill, and, particularly importantly, crude oil.

This means they can be used to turn spilled oils and fuels into gels that then can be easily scooped up and taken out of the environment after a devastating oil spill.

Taking this even one step further, these gels can be squeezed or distilled to give you back your spilled liquid, and this should prove to become a much better way to clean up oil spills.

By doing a little bit of chemical engineering and materials science we can make sure these gels are strong enough to be taken out of aquatic environment, or in the case of thickened edible oils, soft enough to be spread easily but retain their shape.

By being both the designer of the molecules and also the engineer who tailors them to applications we have a complete control over the design process, which allows us to create sustainable solutions to a variety of problems.

As these molecular gels are made of small molecules (not much bigger than table sugar) our work qualifies as nanotechnology, which focuses on systems that are a billionth the size of, for example, yourself.

Though this work jumps between sub disciplines in chemistry and engineering, by leveraging out tools in each we can strive to solve the complex problems of today, and perhaps prepare ourselves for those of tomorrow.”

Julian Silverman is currently researching how compounds obtained from fruits and oils can be utilised in a number of applications, including helping to clean up oil spills at sea. Here, he explains the chemistry behind the process and how it works.

CHECK OUT: 12 healthy habits to get a better night's sleep, according to scientists

SEE ALSO: Here's how much actual pumpkin is in that pumpkin spice latte

Join the conversation about this story »

NOW WATCH: This 3-minute animation will change the way you see the universe

Along with a changing environment inevitably comes a changing set of animals.

For some, climate change is forcing them to adapt and find new habitats to live in. But for others, their changing environments are seriously threatening their existence.

In a series of images from theNovember issue of National Geographic magazine, photographer Joel Sartore captured the animals are in the best and worst shape to survive climate change.

CHECK OUT: Giant, ancient viruses are thawing out in Siberia — and they're changing everything we thought we knew about them

UP NEXT: These 10 cities have the worst air pollution in the world, and it is up to 15 times dirtier than what is considered healthy

Loser: Arctic Fox. This furry creature does best in the coldest of winters. With their Arctic tundra habitat melting, the Arctic foxes will have less of a shot at finding food for their pups.

Winner: American Bullfrog. These amphibians are doing a great job at being an invasive species. The bullfrog has made its way onto other continents, so the threat of climate change may come more as a boost than a hindrance.

Loser: White-Fronted Lemur. National Geographic reports that these lemurs in Madagascar will lose 60% of their habitat in the next 70 years. But, the biggest problem will be the pressure of a growing human population and its ever-more-intensive farming practices.

NOW WATCH: This US president would become 'irrational' and 'pass out' after one or two drinks

Trouble is brewing underneath the greater Los Angeles area.

Within the next 2.5 years, an earthquake of at least magnitude 5.0 could hit the city. A magnitude 5.0 earthquake is a moderate earthquake, but it can still cause millions of dollars in damage to densely populated cities like Los Angeles.

The chances of this happening are practically inevitable: 99.9% according to a national team of scientists led by NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California who reported their findings Oct. 7 in the journal Earth and Space Science.

Last year, a 5.1-magnitude earthquake shook the northeastern region of Los Angeles in suburban La Habra. The quake broke over a dozen water mains and a gas line, and caused widespread damage to the infrastructure throughout Orange County which experts estimated cost over $12 million in repairs.

Since then, the team have been monitoring the rocks in the surrounding environment. And they've noticed something ominous.

During and after last year's earthquake, the researchers used GPS satellites and air-based radar technology to map changes in the size and shape of rocks in Earth's crust — a process called deformation.

Their data showed the these changes had a "broader pattern than would be expected" from an earthquake of that magnitude, the scientists reported in their paper.

"When the La Habra earthquake happened, it was relieving some of that stress, and it actually shook some of the upper sediments in the LA basin and moved those a little bit more," Andrea Donellan, who is lead author of the paper, told CBS Los Angeles.

Here's a map of where Orange County is in California (on left) and where La Habra is in Orange County (on right): While some stress was relieved, there's still more built up in those same faults. And the scientists anticipate that within the next 2.5 years the fault will alleviate that stress once more, causing an earthquake of at least magnitude 5.0.

The team predicts that the chance of a magnitude 5.0 earthquake is 99.9% while the chance of an even greater magnitude 6.0 earthquake is 35%.

While the scientists can't predict exactly where the earthquake will strike, they have narrowed it down to a circle that extends approximately 62 miles out from the central point where last year's earthquake hit.

Other scientists, however, are skeptical of the team's certainty. Particularly because earthquakes are notoriously difficult to predict — so much so, it's never been done before, according to Thomas Heaton, a professor of engineering seismology and the director of the Earthquake Engineering Research Laboratory at Caltech.

"As far as I'm concerned there has never been a successful earthquake prediction and a scientific breakthrough would be required for us to make a scientifically based prediction," Heaton told the San Gabriel Valley Tribune. He went on to explain how the methods the team used have "been shown to have minimal predictive power." But added:

"That said, earthquakes tend to cluster in time and space, and the fact that there have been recent events in the La Habra area tells us that there is a reasonable likelihood that there will be more."

READ MORE: 12 healthy habits to get a better night's sleep, according to scientists

SEE ALSO: The largest astronomy image of all time reveals something amazing

Join the conversation about this story »

NOW WATCH: This nuclear power plant has been dubbed California’s Fukushima

For most beachgoers, sunscreen is a necessity, but a common ingredient found in many sunscreens can prove toxic to coral, a study released on Tuesday found.

The ingredient, oxybenzone, has a particularly damaging effect on young coral, limiting their ability to reproduce and likely contributing to the decline of coral reefs around the world, according to the study, which was published Wednesday in the Archives of Environmental Contamination and Toxicology.

An international team of scientists, including researchers from the United States and Israel, found the highest concentrations of oxybenzone near coral reefs at popular beaches, including in Hawaii and the Caribbean.

Even a tiny amount of the ingredient – 62 parts per trillion, or a drop of water in six olympic-sized swimming pools – can prove toxic to young coral, but in higher concentrations, it can also prove fatal to adult coral.

Swimmers aren't the only vehicles delivering the chemical into the water. The researchers say nearby wastewater discharges can also harm the coral.

“Oxybenzone pollution predominantly occurs in swimming areas, but it also occurs on reefs 5 to 20 miles from the coastline as a result of submarine freshwater seeps that can be contaminated with sewage,” says Omri Bronstein, a zoologist from Tel Aviv University, one of the principal researchers, in a statement.

Craig Downs, a scientist at the non-profit Haereticus Environmental Laboratory in Virginia, who led the study, says the research helps explain why scientists aren’t seeing baby corals in existing reefs at many popular beaches.

While applying sunscreen is often suggested before snorkeling or scuba diving around a reef, researchers say the oxybenzone in the lotion can compromise the health of the coral leaving it susceptible to "bleaching," the loss of the beneficial zoozanthellae that live in the coral and lend the reef it's color. Such bleaching was also associated with events like El Niño, which warms up the surface temperature of the sea, they add. The ingredient can also prompt the coral to develop a hard coating and effectively encase itself in its skeleton and die.

Between 4,000 and 6,000 tons of sunscreen ends up in coral reefs every year, the National Park Service estimates, while popular beaches in Hawaii and the Caribbean have concentrations of more than 12 times that amount, seawater test show.

In the US Virgin Islands, the concentration of oxybenzone is 23 times higher than the minimum amount that can prove toxic to corals, the researchers found.

The Park Services reports that there’s no completely “reef-friendly” sunscreen, but beach visitors can consider sunscreens that contain natural ingredients like titanium oxide and zinc oxide, minerals which are often found in children’s sunscreens, as alternatives to those with oxybenzone.

Wearing sun-protecting clothing, including long-sleeves, hats, and rash guards in the water, can also reduce the risk of harm to coral, the researchers say.

They hope the study will help draw attention to the risk oxybenzone poses to coral and the marine environment more generally and encourage the use of alternatives to harmful sunscreens. 

“Current concentrations of oxybenzone in these coral reef areas pose a significant ecological threat,” Dr. Bronstein says.

 This report contains material from Reuters.

Join the conversation about this story »

NOW WATCH: These dresses respond to the Earth’s magnetic field — and you won’t see them anywhere near fashion week

Three years after Hurricane Sandy destroyed much of the Jersey Shore, some areas are still rebuilding.

Stevens Institute of Technology, from Hoboken, New Jersey, has a plan to make future storms far less devastating, not just in New Jersey, but in all of the world's vulnerable coastal regions.

A group of students from the university are behind SURE HOUSE, the concept home that won this year's Solar Decathlon— the biannual competition put on by the US Department of Energy to give college students a shot at reimagining eco-friendly residential life.

The Stevens team wanted to make a house that could withstand the sudden and crushing storms that are becoming "the new normal" in coastal living.

They say their design is "hurricane-resistant,"complete with storm shutters made of composite foam and wrapped in fiberglass. The solar-powered home, which has a public USB charging spot outside, can also serve as a power hub for other homes in case of emergency.

"In 2015 we are finding climate change to be the major problem facing the world," A.J. Elliott, a Stevens graduate student in electrical engineering, tells Tech Insider.

SURE HOUSE serves as just one solution, he explains. Its energy-efficient design can help reduce the effects of climate change and protect at-risk properties.

The team relied on the "passive house model." Passive houses are built to maximize energy efficiency simply through the materials used and construction design. They are better at retaining heat and ventilating rooms, and they don't require radiators or A/C units to do so.

SURE HOUSE features solar panels that can supply power to the house in the event of an outage, a lift mechanism that elevates the house during "periodic nuisance flooding," high-performance windows, and a dual system of thick insulation and air-sealing to keep the house at a comfortable temperature.  

Stevens Institute's design earned 950 points out of a possible 1,000 in the competition. Over a nine-day stretch, judges evaluated each home based on its affordability, livability, and eco-friendliness. Teams performed daily activities like laundry, cooking, and dishwashing to demonstrate the design's energy efficiency.

The State University of New York at Buffalo came in second, with 941.191 points, and California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo, came in third with 910.

Elliott says the team has no plans of manufacturing SURE HOUSE anytime soon, although the designs are freely available online. His larger hope is that designers and architects will be mindful of the greater impact their buildings will have years down the line.

"A big change that is happening to future designs and must continue to happen," he says, "is reduction in energy use before implementing renewable generation, such as solar."

In other words, sustainability shouldn't just be a goal for the energy our homes consume. It should be a goal for the homes themselves. Years of devastation could be on the line.

Join the conversation about this story »

NOW WATCH: These ingenious tiny homes move with you from city to city

On Oct. 7 a NASA-led team of scientists published a report in the prestigious, peer-reviewed journal Earth and Space Science stating that the greater Los Angeles area — particularly near its subarb of La Habra — has a 99.9% chance of suffering a magnitude 5.0 earthquake within the next 2.5 years.

When the news of this disturbing statistic hit headlines, the US Geological Survey took action. Established in 1979, the USGS has major offices across the country that focus on policies related to Earth sciences including risk from earthquakes and damage from fracking.

In a rare event, the governemnt-run scientific agency published a public statement on Oct. 20 refuting NASA's report and asserting their own independent estimates, which suggests an 85% probability for a magnitude-5.0 earthquake to hit the same region. The refute reads as follows:

USGS Statement on JPL La Habra Study in the news:

This paper claims a 99.9% probability of an earthquake of magnitude 5 or greater occurring in the next 3 years within a large area of Southern California without providing a clear description of how these numbers were derived. The area—a 100 km radius circle centered on the city of La Habra—is a known seismically active area. For this same area, the community developed and accepted model of earthquake occurrence, "UCERF3", which is the basis of the USGS National Seismic Hazard Maps, gives a 3-year probability of 85%. In other words, the accepted random chance of a M5 or greater in this area in 3 years is 85%, independent of the analysis in this paper.

While the earthquake forecast presented in this paper has been published in the online journal Earth and Space Sciences, it has not yet been examined by the long-established committees that evaluate earthquake forecasts and predictions made by scientists. These committees, the California Earthquake Prediction Evaluation Council, which advises the California Office of Emergency Services, and the National Earthquake Prediction Evaluation Council, which advises the U.S. Geological Survey, were established to provide expert, independent assessment of earthquake predictions.

The earthquake rate implied by the 99.9% probability is significantly higher than observed at any time previously in Southern California, and the lack of details on the method of analysis makes a critical assessment of this approach very difficult. Therefore, the USGS does not consider the analysis presented in this paper a reason to change our assessment of the hazard.

Scientists at the USGS are not the only ones who questioned the paper's results. Thomas Heaton, a professor of engineering seismology and the director of the Earthquake Engineering Research Laboratory at Caltech, recently told the San Gabriel Valley Tribune:

“While the authors are credible scientists, this paper does not meet my definition of science. That is, this type of slip deficit has been tried in the past, but it has been shown to have minimal predictive power."

READ MORE: Scientists say there's a 99.9% chance of a destructive earthquake slamming a major city before 2018

SEE ALSO: The largest astronomy image of all time reveals something amazing

Join the conversation about this story »

NOW WATCH: This nuclear power plant has been dubbed California’s Fukushima

The yearly Nevada festival of Burning Man is many things. 

It is a place where 65,000 people descend on a 7-square-mile patch of the Black Rock Desert, getting whipped by sandstorms, and, of course, burning "the man."

But as the "leave no trace" rule declares, Burning Man is not a garbage can. Everything set up at the start of the week must come down.

This before-and-after image, created by the Daily Overview, reveals just how great of an undertaking that can be. Slide the bar to see the transition. 

To make sure the "leave no trace" rule is upheld, Burning Man relies on a Playa Restoration Team (The "playa" is the land used during the festival).

Crews of people determine which areas have the most trash — or, as Burners call it, "matter out of place," or MOOP.

They color-code the areas based on severity, green being the lightest MOOP areas, yellow being moderate, and red being the most moopy — Burning Man's words, not mine — and have a line of people clean up each area.

Then the transformation back into an ordinary desert is complete.

Join the conversation about this story »

NOW WATCH: 8 scary facts about a world with 11 billion people

Though many who live around the San Francisco Bay don’t yet know it, Silicon Valley and Bay Area businesses face a new threat to their well-being and continued growth.

Ironically for drought-stricken California, the threat comes not from an economic bubble or market crash, but from the growing potential of a major flood event that could cause the bay to jump its boundaries.

How could this happen?

Start with the fact that dozens of tech campuses, including Cisco, Oracle, Facebook, and Google (as well as other major employers and residential communities), are in low-lying areas right along the bay shoreline. Add in a dangerous mix of neglected shoreline infrastructure, as well as rising sea levels and more frequent storm events brought about by climate change, and you get a dangerous combination.

Historically, California — and especially the Bay Area — is no stranger to flooding, although it’s sporadic and usually localized. A storm last March sent waters into low-lying areas of San Jose and other recent storms have flooded Highway 101, the major traffic artery below San Francisco.

In the historical record, there have also been huge storms, like one that bankrupted California in 1862. Northern California is overdue for this kind of extreme storm, and El Niño is right around the corner.

Sean Randolph, senior director for the Bay Area Council Economic Institute, warns that a major storm would put tremendous strain on the infrastructure designed to keep water from flooding low-lying communities and businesses.

“A lot of the infrastructure along our shoreline is very old,” says Randolph, whose organization released a report earlier this year outlining the effects of a major storm on the region. “It needs to be upgraded. It needs to be replaced.”

What's at stake

Silicon Valley businesses are not the only ones at risk if a storm were to overtake our aging shoreline infrastructure and cause a major flood. Thousands of homes in communities like Alviso and East Palo Alto would suffer damage from flooding.

“We estimated that a major storm in the Bay Area could cost as much as $10.4 billion,” says Randolph. “Most of that is damage to buildings, damage to the contents of those buildings, loss of electrical power, loss of access to air transport.”

Even residents who live up in the hills would not be insulated. Much of the critical infrastructure that everyone relies on, such as airports, hospitals, and water treatment plants, is in the flood-risk zone.

What can the Bay Area do?

There are simple, low-cost solutions that scientists and experts agree will protect Bay Area communities:

• Building and updating the levees and outdated infrastructure.
• Restoring wetlands that act as natural flood protectors.
• Bolstering and supporting federal, state, and local efforts to create and restore flood-control infrastructure.

The good news is that defending the region against Bay flooding by restoring natural wetlands will also improve bay water quality and preserve it for decades to come.

This isn't a moonshot solution. It's doable. It's within our means. All it takes is for us to act.

Watch this film for more information:

Join the growing coalition in support of protecting the bay for generations to come.

This post is sponsored by Our Bay on the Brink.

Find out more about Sponsored Content.

Join the conversation about this story »

A category 5 hurricane is about to slam into Mexico, NOAA reported on Friday.

With 200-mph winds, Hurricane Patricia is considered the strongest Eastern North Pacific hurricane on record.

Here's what the storm looked like as of October 22:

As of 11 a.m. ET on Friday, Patricia was headed north toward southwest Mexico, where it's expected to make landfall as a category 5 storm, the strongest category on the Saffir-Simpson Hurricane Wind Scale. 

Astronaut Scott Kelly took these disturbing shots of the storm from space:

And it's appeared to have broken the Dvorak scale, which estimates intensity based on satellite imaging:

As of 11 a.m. ET, a hurricane warning is in effect from San Blas to Punta San Telmo, Mexico. A hurricane watch (which just means hurricane conditions are possible) has been issued for the region East of Punta San Telmo to Lazaro Cardenas. A tropical storm warning is also in effect in that region, and North of San Blas to El Roblito.

Here's a map of Patricia's expected trajectory:

The NOAA says the storm could bring "life-threatening flash floods and mudslides" as well as deadly rip current and surf conditions.

Patricia has intensified incredibly fast. As Bob Henson writes on his Weather Underground blog, "In a mere 36 hours, Patricia’s official NHC rating went from minimal tropical storm (40 mph) to Category 5 hurricane — among the most rapid intensification rates one might expect in a hurricane anywhere."

Here's an enhanced-color animation of the storm winds:

We'll keep you posted as the storm develops throughout the day.

CHECK OUT: Something historic is happening with hurricanes in the Pacific Ocean — and it could mean trouble

UP NEXT: Before-and-after photos of China's air show just how terrible its air pollution is

Join the conversation about this story »

NOW WATCH: NASA just terrified Los Angeles and ticked off a government agency by saying there's a 99.9% chance of a 5.0 earthquake

Mmm, nothing like sitting back and cracking open a cold can of crisp amber ale...that was once sewage.

A municipal water utility in Portland, Oregon, recently held a contest to see who could brew the tastiest beer from what was once wastewater — i.e. the stuff that runs off our farms and goes down our toilets — and we got to try it.

But don't worry — the water used to brew the beer was strictly purified, and meets or exceeds the standards for drinking water (which specifies safe levels of bacteria, heavy metals, and other toxins).

The contest was designed to raise awareness about water scarcity, and to show that it's perfectly safe to drink purified, recycled water.

"All water has been consumed before, and will be consumed again," Clean Water Services spokesman Mark Jockers told Business Insider. "Let's embrace the yuck factor!"

Embrace it we did.

What sewage beer tastes like

We got our hands on a few cans of an American Amber Ale and a Munich Helles. After chilling it in our office fridge, we got ready to sample it.

As we poured the Amber Ale into a few clear glasses, we tried not to let its color remind us of its unappetizing origins.

We thought the beer smelled fruity and tasted somewhat hoppy and floral.

One colleague said she liked it and would drink it again, but noted that it tasted more like a pale ale. Another said she thought the beer tasted normal.

But not everyone liked it. Some of my other colleagues tasted the Purewater Brew Munich Helles side-by-side with a Yuengling. One of them (pictured at right) said the flavor was pretty generic, like Bud Light or Coors Light.

Most of them didn't like the taste of the Helles, citing its cloudiness and weird aftertaste. Though it's hard to say if they were influenced by knowing the beer's history.

However, the beers we tried were just a sampling of the many varieties on offer.

More than two dozen brewers took part in the contest and winners were selected this summer. First place went to a German Pilsner. Other beers included a Cascadian dark ale, a Belgian pale ale, and an American pale ale.

The point of the beer contest was simply to show people that recycled water is perfectly fine to drink.

After all, no matter where water comes from, "we should be judging it by its quality, not its history," Jockers said.

NEXT UP: How an infection turned a man's guts into a beer-brewing machine

SEE ALSO: How to pour and taste beer like a pro

Join the conversation about this story »

NOW WATCH: Is draft beer better than bottled beer?

Carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere are on the rise. That's one thing even the climate change skeptics can't challenge.

And most climate experts agree that CO2 emissions from humans is increasing Earth's overall temperatures at a faster rate than at any other time in recorded history.

However, there are some people out there — even scientists — who question whether Earth will, in fact, warm up over the next 100 years and how it will effect Earth's overall climate and ecosystems.

Here are some of the scientists who have gone on record with their controversial views:

DON'T MISS: Scientists say there's a 99.9% chance of a destructive earthquake slamming a major city before 2018

SEE ALSO: Simple science-backed steps to finding your purpose in life

Craig Idso is founder and former president of the Center for the Study of Carbon Dioxide and Global Change, which is a non-profit organization that publishes the newsletter CO2Science, which sharply disputes scientific opinion on climate change.

Last year, a recurring face at the annual International Conference on Climate Change, Craig Idso said "There is no dangerous human influence on Earth's climate from a rise in CO2." 

Idso asserts that rising CO2 and resulting warmer temperatures will not only greatly benefit plant growth but will also reduce the risk of cardiovascular deaths in humans, as well as other spectacular claims.

His presentation, which you can watch here, is overwhelmingly positive, choosing to focus on the plants and animals that will thrive from raising CO2 and completely neglecting those that could go extinct, or the islands that will disappear, or the damage done by flooding coast lines.

Patrick Moore is the former president of Greenpeace Canada, a non-governmental environmental organization that focuses its campaigns on climate change, deforestation, overfishing, and other worldwide issues.

Earlier this year Patrick Moore told Energy Live News"I am firmly of the belief that the future will show that this whole hysteria over climate change was a complete fabrication."

According to Greenpeace, Moore "exploits long-lost ties" with the organization to sell his anti-environmental opinions on carbon dioxide. Moore thinks that this greenhouse gas is in no way related to global warming and that it's a "good thing" that we're putting more into the atmosphere. He's forgetting the overwhelming evidence to the contrary.

Anastasios Tsonis is a distinguished professor of atmospheric science at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee whose research is widely touted by climate-change-denial outlets like Climate Depot.

Anastasios Tsonis has said he's not a climate change denier, but he also is of the belief that Earth is not necessarily getting any warmer. Tsonis is part of a group of scientists who think that Earth's climate flips between a "warm mode" and "cool mode" every 20 to 30 years, driven by oceanic temperatures, particularly the Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation (AMO) current.

Right now we're in a "cool mode,"he told British journalist David Rose in 2010. "We have such a change now and can therefore expect 20 or 30 years of cooler temperatures." While the AMO is a confirmed natural phenomenon, there is controversy as to its periodic changes and influence on climate.  

NOW WATCH: Kesha sued her producer for sexual assault, and she says it's destroying her career

The Great Aletsch Glacier is one of Europe's largest glaciers, winding over 14 miles through the Swiss Alps.

And it's vanishing rapidly.

Andreas Vieli, a professor heading a team of glaciology experts at the University of Zurich, recently told Reuters that the Aletsch Glacier could lost 90% of its ice before the end of the century from warming temperatures.

To make sure this majestic, vast river of ice is not forgotten, Switzerland-based news photographer Denis Balibouse took these gorgeous photos of the Aletsch Glacier.

Enjoy.

READ MORE: Simple science-backed steps to finding your purpose in life

CHECK OUT: QUIZ: Are these pictures of Mars or Earth?

The Aletsch glacier in southern Switzerland is the largest glacier in the Alps. It's so large that you can see it from space, which is handy for tracking its retreat over time.

These two comparison photos, taken by NASA satellites, show how the outer edges of the Aletsch Glacier have shrunk. The top photo was taken in summer 2014; the bottom one was taken in summer 1987.

On either side of the Aletsch Glacier are mountains that can tower as tall as 2.5 miles.

NOW WATCH: Kesha sued her producer for sexual assault, and she says it's destroying her career

Scientists at Clemson University have figured out an incredible way to make drops of water hover in mid-air. And the result is mesmerizing.

Produced By Matt Johnston

Follow TI: On Facebook

Join the conversation about this story »

Besides likening themselves to cattle shoved into an airborne metal tube, there's nothing airline passengers like to complain about more than how terrible airplane food is. But how and where those disappointing in-flight meals get made is rarely thought of. 

United Airlines recently let our cameras into its catering facility, Chelsea Food Services, near Newark International Airport in New Jersey. Surprisingly, the food we saw was super fresh, made entirely by hand, and meticulously planned in advance. Another shocker? The airline's newest menu additions are actually pretty good. 

Keep scrolling to see all of the work that goes into the making of your in-flight meals, and to find out about the shocking waste that occurs when your flight is delayed.  

SEE ALSO: The way United Airlines chooses your in-flight meal is far more intricate than you'd think

Welcome to United's Chelsea Food Services facility, where a team of 1,000 produces 33,000 meals per day.

Food services manager Leon Britton showed us around. Britton has worked here for 28 years.

Absolutely everyone is required to wear a hair net, and most wear lab coats. To our eyes, the facility was spotlessly clean.

Parts of Indonesia have been smothered in haze due to the widespread agricultural practice of "slash-and-burn" farming and a prolonged dry season. In some places, the fires are burning out of control, forcing people to stay home from school and work, and causing respiratory infections in hundreds of thousands. 

A group of elephants from the Conservation and Natural Resources Agency were recently commissioned to help battle the fires, working difficult terrain in a wildlife preserve to carry crews and equipment. 

"We used them to help the mobilization of Manggala Agni's (Forest Fire Fighter) equipment to reach the hot spots located in Track 21, Padang Sugihan,"Nunu Anugrah, head of Conservation and Natural Resources Agency of South Sumatra province, told Reuters. "We have used them for five days. The fire has now been extinguished. There were five elephants that we used to help put out the fire."

Story by Julie Zeveloff and editing by Carl Mueller.

INSIDER is on Facebook: Follow us here

Join the conversation about this story »

Climate change could make the hottest summer days in the Persian Gulf today the norm by 2100. The new extreme could exceed the hottest temperature ever recorded on Earth, according to a study published Oct. 26 in Nature Climate Change.

And those kinds of temperatures are "intolerable" for humans, the scientists said in the study.

By 2100, if nothing is done to mitigate climate change and the world proceeds in a business-as-usual scenario, a typical extreme day's temperature could be 113 degrees Fahrenheit in many areas, exceeding 140 degrees Fahrenheit in Kuwait City. 

This permanent heat wave could make living in and around the Persian Gulf and Red Sea unbearable, the authors write — making working outside virtually impossible, and turning air conditioning into a universal necessity.

"Electricity demands for air conditioner use, for example, would considerably increase in the future to adapt to projected changes in climate and population," they wrote. "Although it may be feasible to adapt indoor activities in the rich oil countries of the region, even the most basic outdoor activities are likely to be severely impacted."

But the global demand for air conditioning is also partly to blame for the planet's continued warming. Because of climate change, air-conditioning energy demand is expected to increase 72% by 2100, according to a 2009 study in Energy Policy.

That study also found that the need to heat and cool because of climate change will increase carbon emissions from 0.8 gigatonnes in 2000 to 2.2 gigatonnes in 2100 — accounting for 12% of the total CO2 emissions coming from energy use.

This huge number is largely because the air conditioners we use today rely on today use hydrofluorocarbons, or HFCs, which are greenhouse gases, and are powered by electricity, most of which is still generated using fossil fuels like coal and natural gas.

The efficiency of air conditioners has increased by about 30% in the last decade, according to a story on Yale University's e360. And if we are going to stay cool in extremely hot areas like the Persian Gulf, we will need to keep making them more efficient.

We'll also have to stop relying so heavily on fossil fuels to generate our electricity, and switch to renewable sources like solar, wind, and hydroelectric.

The worst of the worst projected temperatures can be mitigated by cutting carbon emissions now, the Nature Climate Change study found. But these decisions to cut down on greenhouse gas pollution — which have to be agreed upon by big governments followed through by corporations and individuals — have been slow in coming.

The United Nations Conference on Climate Change coming up in Paris this December, however, could be the place to make these actions binding, and make the need to cull climate change a reality.

Join the conversation about this story »

NOW WATCH: This animated map shows how humans migrated across the globe

A number of cities in the Persian Gulf region may be unlivable by the end of the century due to global warming if humans do not curb greenhouse gas emissions, according to new research.

The study, published in the journal Nature Climate Change, projects that by the end of the century heat waves in Doha, Abu Dhabi and Bandar Abbas could lead to temperatures at which humans physically cannot survive over a sustained period of time by around 2100.

The threshold, estimated around 170ºF, takes into account heat and humidity that prevent humans from exercising natural functions that allow the body to cool.

“Such severe heat waves are expected to occur only once every decade or every few decades,” said study author Elfatih A. B. Eltahir, a professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. “But when they happen they will be quite lethal.”

Even without heat waves, residents of the region should prepare for today’s extreme temperatures to become the new normal. In some cities throughout the region, temperatures on an ordinary summer day could exceed 140ºF (60ºC). And, while those who can afford air conditioning may retreat to their homes, many others will be left behind.

The extreme heat waves forecast in the study would interrupt industry in the region as well as other practices. For one, workers would be unable to stay outdoors for extended periods of time, affecting a number of businesses, including the oil industry that largely fuels the regional economy. The heat waves would also disrupt the Hajj pilgrimage that draws millions of Muslims to Mecca each year.

Deadly heat waves have already affected many regions around the world. More than 2,300 people died in a heatwave in India earlier this year. The researchers behind the new study say the heat waves they studied would be “significantly more severe.”

The extreme heat waves forecast in the study may be avoidable if countries around the world take action to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions, the researchers behind the study say. The extreme heat waves with temperatures exceeding 170ºF will likely not occur even under a moderate mitigation scenario where the world holds temperature increase to somewhere between 2°F (1.1°C) to 4.68°F (2.6°C) by 2100 rather than the expected 7.2°F (4°C) increase without any action.

The research comes just weeks before a conference where leaders from around the world hope to announce a global agreement to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and keep average temperatures from rising more than 3.6°F (2°C) by 2100.

SEE ALSO: Gorgeous photos of a rapidly vanishing natural wonder that could be gone before 2100

CHECK OUT: NASA satellites reveal something startling about the future of food on Earth

Join the conversation about this story »

NOW WATCH: Animated map shows what Europe would look like if all the Earth's ice melted

Although recycling has been understood for decades to provide economic and environmental benefits to society, new research shows that it may be best to recycle in moderation. 

"It makes sense to recycle commercial cardboard and some paper, as well as selected metals and plastics," J. Winston Porter, a former official at the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), told The New York Times.

"But other materials rarely make sense ... The zero-waste goal [outlined by cities like New York and Seattle] makes no sense at all – it's very expensive with almost no real environmental benefit."

According to a recent study in the journal Nature, Americans throw away twice as much trash as the EPA previously thought. And while landfills are one of the largest man-made sources of greenhouse gasses, researchers warn that too much recycling can have a negative effect on society due to the high costs associated with transporting and processing recyclable goods, and manufacturing with recycled material.

In a new study examining government-mandated recycling programs in developed countries like Japan, researchers found that the socially optimal recycling rate is actually closer to 10 percent of all disposed goods – a figure much lower than the current rate of 19 percent and 34 percent currently practiced in Japan and the United States, respectively.

The authors of that particular study, published in the Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, list several reasons for why this may be the case, chief among them the costs of managing recycling plants and manufacturing goods with recycled materials. In other words, the environmental benefits achieved through participating in nationally-imposed recycling programs may be outweighed by the cost required to run them.

As John Tierney writes in The New York Times, “Despite decades of exhortations and mandates, it’s still typically more expensive for municipalities to recycle household waste than to send it to a landfill.”

Looking at the environmental and economic costs of recycling, Mr. Tierney argues that while it may make economic sense to recycle paper and some metals, there is a much more limited benefit to recycling plastics and yard waste.

The cost of transporting goods for recycling to landfills can also offset the environmental benefits recycling is thought to achieve: in New York City, for instance, it cost approximately $300, on average, for the city to process and then dispose of one ton of recyclable goods, according to figures from 2004.

Bucknell University economics professor Thomas Kinnaman recommends a targeted recycling program, one that would focus chiefly on those goods that wreak the most environmental havoc to produce from scratch, like plastic, paper, and some metals. They also recommend taking the additional step of reducing our collective consumption, and reusing where we can.

One possible solution, according to Tierney, is a tax on trash disposed of at landfills, which municipalities could use to offset environmental costs in the most fiscally responsible way. For now, thanks to wide support among voters and special interests, politicians like New York Mayor Bill de Blasio will likely continue to push recycling further. According to the mayor, New York City will be "garbage free" by 2030, thanks in large part to an unprecedented increase in recycling.

SEE ALSO: Gorgeous photos of a rapidly vanishing natural wonder that could be gone before 2100

CHECK OUT: These cities have the worst air pollution in the world, and it is up to 15 times dirtier than what is considered healthy

Join the conversation about this story »

NOW WATCH: We Put A GoPro Through The Recycling Process

By 2100, the most extreme summer days seen today could become the new norm in the Persian Gulf.

Today, "wet-bulb temperatures" in the summer typically reach 88 degrees Fahrenheit every 20 days, but climate change could make every day this unbearably hot, according to a study published Oct. 26 in Nature Climate Change.

The wet-bulb temperature accounts for both heat and humidity. If this reading gets above 95 degrees Fahrenheit, the human body can no longer cool itself off, even when fully drenched with sweat. This is when health problems like heat stroke can set in, even for young and healthy people. The temperature we typically hear in a weather report is the dry-bulb measurement.

If nothing is done to mitigate climate change and the world proceeds in a business-as-usual scenario, the study found that a typical extreme day's dry-bulb temperature in 2100 could be 113 degrees Fahrenheit in many areas of the Persian Gulf, even exceeding 140 degrees Fahrenheit in Kuwait City.

Here's what that looks like, in graph form:

The study projected Yemen's coast around the cities of Al-Hudaydah and Aden could reach wet-bulb temps of 91 degrees Fahrenheit in extreme years. "Under such conditions," the authors wrote in the study, "climate change would possibly lead to premature death of the weakest — namely children and elderly."

By the end of the century, if carbon emissions continue at the rate they're at today, wet-bulb temperatures in the cities of Abu Dhabi, Dubai, Doha, Dhahran and Bandar Abbas could top the 95 degrees Fahrenheit threshold several times in the 30 years at the end of this century.

Based on the researcher's predictions, the purple areas in this map could be the most intolerable.

In Mecca, where the Muslim pilgrimage Hajj takes place in the western middle of Saudi Arabia, annual maximum wet-bulb temperatures could soar to 91 degrees Fahrenheit, with annual maximum dry-bulb temps rising above 131 degrees Fahrenheit.

While oil-rich countries can rely on air conditioning to get by indoors, "even the most basic outdoor activities are likely to be severely impacted," by the temperature increase, the authors wrote. On the other hand, they write, "the relatively poor countries of Southwest Asia with limited financial resources and declining or non-existent oil production will probably suffer both indoors and outdoors."

Luckily, there is a solution. If the world starts to mitigate carbon emissions, the authors wrote that the annual maximum wet-bulb temperature in Mecca would only be about 2 degrees Celsius higher in 2100 than it is today.

But if emissions aren't mitigated and business continues as usual, the mean global temperature is projected to rise 4 degrees Celsius by 2100. Globally, this increase doesn't sound like a lot, but you start to see the measurable effects it will have once you look at regional changes like the ones in this study.

The graphic below, from the paper, really says it all.

The top row shows the 30-year maximum wet-bulb temperatures today (left) and in 2100 if the world mitigates carbon emissions (middle), and in 2100 if emissions continue on a business-as-usual path (right). The bottom row shows the 30-year maximum dry-bulb temperatures for those three scenarios.

The really scary part of those graphics is the purple coloring on the far right maps.

In the top row, the map shows where wet-bulb temps reach 35 degrees Celsius (95 degrees Fahrenheit) — the point when the temperature becomes intolerable, and humans can't cool off anymore.

Similarly, the purple areas on the bottom maps are where dry-bulb temps could reach 60 degrees Celsius (140 degrees Fahrenheit). That's higher than the highest temperature ever recorded on Earth, which was 134 degrees Fahrenheit in Death Valley, California in 1913.

Join the conversation about this story »

NOW WATCH: Neil deGrasse Tyson: Here’s what would happen if the sun disappeared