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NASA issued the following media advisory:

NASA researchers are presenting a wide range of science results at the 2009 fall tiffany of the American Geophysical Union. The meeting opens Dec. 14 and continues through Friday, Dec. 18, at the Moscone Convention Center in San Francisco. It features more than 15,000 talks and poster presentations about the latest in Earth and planetary sciences and heliophysics.

Below are summaries of presentations by NASA researchers and their colleagues who use NASA research paloma picasso. For more information about each topic, including the time and location of the presentations, consult the meeting program at: http://www.agu.org/meetings/fm09/program

Monday, Dec.14 WEATHERED ICE DEPOSITS EXPLAIN MARS GEOLOGY Paul Niles of NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston presents research arguing that the origin of the layered, sulfate-rich sediments at Meridiani Planum on Mars can be attributed to acidic weathering of massive ice deposits. This ice-weathering model best explains the geologic and geochemical observations made from orbit and the surface. The model may provide a consistent explanation for the formation of sediments early in Mars’ history. (Presentation P12A-05)

SEARCHING FOR EXOTIC LIFE: TOO HOT, TOO COLD, JUST RIGHT? When looking for places suitable for life, scientists traditionally have targeted a liquid-water habitable zone about 0.1 astronomical units (AU) from M-dwarf stars. The University of Arizona’s Jonathan Lunine suggests a different approach. The zone about 1 AU from a late M-dwarf star may be much less severe for potential life and quite abundant in the universe. Saturn’s moon Titan is one example of this kind of environment, where hydrocarbon seas may be fostering an exotic type of life. (Presentation B11E-05)

Tuesday, Dec. 15 NEW SATELLITE VIEWS OF EARTH’S VOLCANIC PLUMES The tiffany 1837 on NASA’s Earth Observing System satellites provide rich measurements for mapping volcanic plumes and clouds. In this talk, observations from three of these instruments are used to examine recent eruptions of Alaska’s Augustine volcano and the Sarychev volcano on Russia’s Kuril Island. The combined data reveal the quantity and distribution of sulfur dioxide and silicate ash and sulfate aerosols. (Presentation V21B-1988)

Wednesday, Dec. 16 SATELLITE REVEALS A DECADE OF ATMOSPHERE, LAND AND ENERGY TRENDS After 10 years in orbit, NASA’s Terra Earth-observing satellite has turned up trends and science results that are helping researchers better understand the complex Earth system. Researchers have updated Earth’s energy budget, showing the world is cloudier than we thought, aerosols have an ambiguous yet critical role in climate, and not all urban areas attract and store heat in the same way. Other atmospheric discoveries have helped researchers show how high and far pollution travels. (Sessions U31C, U32A, U33A, U33B)

NASA SCIENTISTS HELP PROTECT ENDANGERED FISH NASA and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) developed models and software for water resource managers to help prevent the death of threatened and endangered fish species in streams and rivers affected by the Central Valley Project in California’s Sacramento River Basin. Scientists at NASA’s Ames Research Center in Moffett Field, Calif., and their colleagues improved the accuracy of stream temperature and freshwater fish mortality models. (Presentation IN34A-03)