Study: Glaciers And Ice Caps To Dominate Sea-Level Rise Through 21st Century

Ice loss from glaciers and ice caps is expected to cause more global sea rise during this century than the massive Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets, according to a new University of Colorado at Boulder study.

The researchers found that glaciers and ice caps are currently contributing about 60 percent of the world's ice to the oceans and the rate has been markedly accelerating in the past decade, said Professor Emeritus Mark Meier of CU-Boulder's Institute of Arctic and Alpine Research, lead study author. The contribution is presently about 100 cubic miles of ice annually -- a volume nearly equal to the water in Lake Erie -- and is rising by about three cubic miles per year.

In contrast, the CU-Boulder team estimated Greenland is now contributing about 28 percent of the total global sea rise from ice loss and Antarctica is contributing about 12 percent. Greenland is not expected to catch up to glaciers and ice caps in terms of sea-level rise contributions until the end of the century, according to the study.

href="http://www.physorg.com/news104082524.html">http://www.physorg.com/news104082524.html

'Sun not responsible for climate change'

The strongest evidence to date that the sun is not responsible for recent global warming has been set out by scientists.

The new study by Prof Michael Lockwood of the Rutherford Appleton Laboratory, near Oxfordshire, and Claus Fröhlich of the World Radiation Center in Davos, Switzerland, overturns claims by climate sceptics who say that the planet's climate has long fluctuated and that current warming is just part of that natural cycle - the result of variation in the sun's output and not greenhouse gas emissions. Their study appears in the Proceedings of the Royal Society A.

The study found that global warming since 1985 has been caused neither by an increase in solar radiation nor by a decrease in the flux of galactic cosmic rays.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/main.jhtml?xml=/earth/2007/07/11/scisun111.xml

Mystery coffins opened in 2,500-year-old tomb

JING'AN, Jiangxi, July 1 (Xinhua) -- Chinese archaeologists have started to excavate a 2,500-year-old tomb containing 47 coffins made of a rare wood called nanmu in east China's Jiangxi Province.

The tomb, in Lijia village in Jing'an county, is 16 meters long, about 11.5 meters wide and three meters deep. It is believed to date back to the Eastern Zhou Dynasty (770-221 B.C.).

It is the largest group of coffins ever discovered in a single tomb and the excavation has been dubbed "the most important archaeology project of the year" by cultural experts and media.

Nine coffins were opened by archaeologists earlier because they were rotten and partly destroyed by tomb robbers. Archaeologists opened another coffin on Sunday morning, finding a relatively complete human skeleton, bodily tissue, as well as many bronze, gold and silk items, porcelain and jade.
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2007-07/01/content_6314520.htm

Mystery room discovered at China's terra cotta tomb

BEIJING, China (AP) -- Chinese researchers say they have found a strange pyramid-shaped chamber while surveying the massive underground tomb of China's first emperor and theorize it was built as a passageway for his soul.

Thousands of terra cotta warriors were discovered more than 20 years ago near the ancient capital of Xi'an.

Remote sensing equipment has revealed what appears to be a 100-foot-high room above Emperor Qin Shihuang's tomb near the ancient capital of Xi'an in Shaanxi province, the official Xinhua News Agency reported Sunday.

The room has not been excavated. Diagrams of the chamber are based on data gathered over five years, starting in 2002, using radar and other remote sensing technologies, the news agency said.

Archaeologist Liu Qingzhu of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences was quoted as saying the room is unlike any ever found in a Chinese tomb.
http://www.cnn.com/2007/TECH/science/07/02/china.ancient.tomb.ap/index.html

Risky descent into the Red Planet's massive Victoria Crater

NASA's Mars rover Opportunity is scheduled to begin a descent down a rock-paved slope into the Red Planet's massive Victoria Crater. This carries real risk for the long-lived robotic explorer, but NASA and the Mars Rover science team expect it to provide valuable science.
http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2007/28jun_descent.htm?list109322

Egyptologists think they have Hatshepsut's mummy

CAIRO (Reuters) - Egyptologists think they have identified with certainty the mummy of Hatshepsut, the most famous queen to rule ancient Egypt, found in a humble tomb in the Valley of the Kings, an archaeologist said on Monday.

Egypt's chief archaeologist, Zahi Hawass, will hold a news conference in Cairo on Wednesday. The Discovery Channel said he would announce what it called the most important find in the Valley of the Kings since the discovery of King Tutankhamun.

The archaeologist, who asked not to be named, said the candidate for identification as the mummy of Hatshepsut was one of two females found in 1903 in a small tomb believed to be that of Hatshepsut's wet-nurse, Sitre In.

Several Egyptologists have speculated over the years that one of the mummies was that of the queen, who ruled from between 1503 and 1482 BC -- at the height of ancient Egypt's power.

The archaeologist said Hawass would present new evidence for an identification but that not all Egyptologists are convinced he will be able to prove his case.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20070625/sc_nm/egypt_mummy_dc_1;_ylt=Anfk0R9Wt0tEWD2n5f3sVyhFeQoB