From the Earth's crust to the far side of the galaxy — geology, climate, natural disasters and astronomy, with every answer explained.
Look down and there is a planet with a molten core, drifting plates and rock that records deep time. Look up and there is a galaxy measured in light-years. Both scales are difficult to hold in your head, and both are more approachable than they seem once someone explains the mechanism. This collection covers the Earth from crust to core, the atmosphere and the cycles keeping it stable, what actually triggers a tsunami or gives a cyclone its eye, and the astronomy beyond all of it — planets, stars, distance and how anyone ever got off the ground.
Red Lists, treaties, corridors and reserves — the practical machinery of protection.
What does the IUCN Red List do?
Rock, ocean, air and living tissue, and the flows of carbon that connect them.
Which pair of processes moves the largest amounts of carbon between the atmosphere and living…
Atmosphere, energy and the cycles that keep things running.
Which gas is the most abundant in Earth's atmosphere?
What separates a mineral from a rock, and where a gemstone gets its colour.
What must a substance have to be classified as a mineral?
The planet from crust to core, and the processes shaping it.
What is the outermost solid layer of the Earth called?
Ice, rivers, wind and waves, and the landforms each of them leaves behind.
What is the difference between weathering and erosion?
Ten catastrophes and the laws, defences and sciences built in their aftermath.
The great earthquake of 1755 that destroyed most of a European capital and helped launch the…
The scales, indices and warning systems behind the numbers in a disaster headline.
The Saffir-Simpson scale rates hurricanes on the basis of what?
What causes extreme events, and how they are measured.
Tsunamis are most commonly triggered by what?
Ten questions on what makes a star shine, what it turns into afterwards, and where your atoms came from.
What process powers a star like the Sun?
Ten milestones from 1957 to 1981, from the first satellite to the first shuttle launch.
What was the first artificial satellite to orbit Earth?
Beyond the planets: stars, distance and getting off the ground.
Which galaxy contains our Solar System?
Phases, tides, the far side and the slow retreat — ten questions on the nearest thing in the sky.
What causes the phases of the Moon?
Ten questions on the eight planets, from the hottest surface to the one lying on its side.
Which planet orbits closest to the Sun?