A gif of a black and white Earth visualization shows parts of North America “glowing”.Glowing plants?Though that might sound like something out of a sci-fi movie, it’s actually a natural process giving scientists clues of impending flash droughts.Flash droughts are just what they sound like; they happen quickly and without much warning. An example of this occurred during the summer of 2012 when a large section of the U.S. experienced the most substantial flash drought it had seen since the Dust Bowl of the 1930s, which lasted for years.Related: Scientists are mapping Earth’s rivers from space before climate change devastates our planetTypically, it takes seasons for a standard drought to develop — with a flash drought, however, expedited drying arises in just weeks. Thus, it’s quite difficult to prepare for them. However, scientists at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California may have a solution. At the end of April, they released a study about their discovery of a way to recognize signs months in advance of a flash drought event. Signs from space, that is. You just have to look for the glow — or, well, lack thereof. It would appear that, in anticipation of a flash drought, the “glow” of a plant begins to dim, and it’s possible to capture such dimming with spacecraft orbiting our planet.More specifically, this glow is not visible to the human eye, but rather can be identified by certain instruments aboard satellites like NASA’s Orbiting Carbon Observatory-2 (OCO-2). According to scientists, the plant glow phenomenon had been recurring on this satellite’s data since 2014, when it arrived in space and began “seeing the light” across the Midwest U.S. throughout the growing season.When plants go through photosynthesis, they bask in sunlight, absorbing our star’s rays to transform water and carbon dioxide into food. During this process, some unused photons, or particles of light, escape …
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[mwai_chat context=”Let’s have a discussion about this article:nn A gif of a black and white Earth visualization shows parts of North America “glowing”.Glowing plants?Though that might sound like something out of a sci-fi movie, it’s actually a natural process giving scientists clues of impending flash droughts.Flash droughts are just what they sound like; they happen quickly and without much warning. An example of this occurred during the summer of 2012 when a large section of the U.S. experienced the most substantial flash drought it had seen since the Dust Bowl of the 1930s, which lasted for years.Related: Scientists are mapping Earth’s rivers from space before climate change devastates our planetTypically, it takes seasons for a standard drought to develop — with a flash drought, however, expedited drying arises in just weeks. Thus, it’s quite difficult to prepare for them. However, scientists at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California may have a solution. At the end of April, they released a study about their discovery of a way to recognize signs months in advance of a flash drought event. Signs from space, that is. You just have to look for the glow — or, well, lack thereof. It would appear that, in anticipation of a flash drought, the “glow” of a plant begins to dim, and it’s possible to capture such dimming with spacecraft orbiting our planet.More specifically, this glow is not visible to the human eye, but rather can be identified by certain instruments aboard satellites like NASA’s Orbiting Carbon Observatory-2 (OCO-2). According to scientists, the plant glow phenomenon had been recurring on this satellite’s data since 2014, when it arrived in space and began “seeing the light” across the Midwest U.S. throughout the growing season.When plants go through photosynthesis, they bask in sunlight, absorbing our star’s rays to transform water and carbon dioxide into food. During this process, some unused photons, or particles of light, escape …nnDiscussion:nn” ai_name=”RocketNews AI: ” start_sentence=”Can I tell you more about this article?” text_input_placeholder=”Type ‘Yes'”]
