Researchers find that shifts in Earth’s orbit can trigger abrupt climate changes, even in warm periods without ice sheets.

To spread awareness that “climate change isn’t just an environmental issue; it’s a human story woven into the fabric of our civilization’s rise and fall,” Georgetown University historian Professor ...

Our planet has a memory. Deep within ice cores and ocean sediments lies evidence of a time when Earth looked fundamentally ...

Our species likes it cold. Homo sapiens evolved in — and still inhabits — one of Earth’s rare and fragile ice ages, periods distinguished not by an abundance of saber-toothed cats and woolly mammoths ...

New research reveals the extent to which Mars is quietly tugging on Earth’s orbit and shaping the cycles that drive long-term ...

While the Milankovitch Cycles operate on timescales far longer than human lifespans, their effects are always at play.

Earth’s Ediacaran Period, roughly 630 to 540 million years ago, has always been something of a magnetic minefield for scientists. During earlier and later time periods, tectonic plates kept a steady ...

Smithsonian researcher Ingrid Romero studies fossil pollen to reconstruct ancient climates and predict future changes Erin Wunderlich Researcher Ingrid Romero holds a case full of pollen slides at the ...

Paul Wilcox descends into Devil’s Canopy Cave on Prince of Wales Island. An unlikely discovery in a cave on Prince of Wales Island could help scientists understand Earth’s climate history. A small ...