Epigenetics is the study of heritable changes in gene expression or cellular phenotype caused by mechanisms other than changes in the underlying DNA sequence (more at Wikipedia).

There is a lot of evidence that epigenetic modifications can last two generations. For example, if your mother was a Holocaust survivor, you could be more prone to post-traumatic stress disorder, as well as your children. Researchers have been trying to discover if such changes can last longer, and become a permanent genetic fixture. Evolution in other words.

This is of great interest to catastrophists – it could mean that global cataclysms were a major ingredient in human evolution. And could again…

DNA extracted from the bones of an extinct bison shows that the environment influenced the way the animal’s genes worked without altering the genetic code. It is the best evidence yet that such epigenetic changes can be fossilized.

…most of the methylations they found were in exactly the same spots as methylations in the same genes of modern cattle.

It’s the first evidence that the environment (in this case the Ice Age) has caused epigenetic modifications that have become evolution.

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I don’t think scientists can ever be 100% sure about this, but new research suggests an impending supereruption can be detected decades in advance, giving us enough time to prepare. Reported at the BBC:

The evidence comes from analysis of crystals in pumice rock from the Santorini site, which the researchers in France, Switzerland and Singapore analysed using modern instrumentation including electron and ion microprobes.

“What we found was that all the crystals in the magma grew within a few decades of the eruption.”

“The new evidence from mineral grains appears to strengthen the idea, which has been developing in recent years, that large magma systems appear to awaken from long periods of repose only shortly (months, years or decades) prior to eruption.

Epigenetics Update / Supervolcano Alert is a post from: 2012 Blog

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Yesterday the Daily Mail has an article about the Laacher See volcano in Germany:

A sleeping super-volcano in Germany is showing worrying signs of waking up.

It’s lurking just 390 miles away underneath the tranquil Laacher See lake near Bonn and is capable of ejecting billions of tons of magma.

This monster erupts every 10 to 12,000 years and last went off 12,900 years ago, so it could blow at any time.

Well, while it could do a lot of harm, that’s normal for a volcano. It’s not a super-volcano, for they are an extinction-level threat. And those bubbles have been happening for centuries. And I’ve not seen any information that suggests this volcano is on a regular cycle. This is a non-story, and no need for people in Europe to be concerned. Wired magazine were quick to point out the same, suggesting that this article is pandering to 2012ers.

But if you do want to worry, that part of Germany had some earthquakes last year.

Laacher See – Nothing New is a post from: 2012 Blog

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Apocalyptic warnings that islands such as the Maldives will sink beneath the waves are far-fetched, said Nils Axel-Morner, former head of the Paleogeophysics and Geodynamics department at Stockholm University.

He says that any rise in sea levels is to do with natural historic fluctuations.

A supervolcanic eruption in Yellowstone Park sends lava and mud flowing toward populated areas, and clouds of ash drifting across the country. The fallout destroys crops and livestock, clogs machinery, and makes cities uninhabitable. Those who survive find themselves caught in an apocalyptic catastrophe in which humanity has no choice but to rise from the ashes and recreate the world…

In Brief: Sea Levels & Supervolcano: Eruption is a post from: 2012 Blog

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This is weak, weak, weak. The headline is quite definite:

Supervolcanoes: Not a Threat For 2012

But if you read the article, NASA expert Adam Voiland (not an expert really, see his resume) points out:

• Volcanologists have many unanswered questions about supervolcanoes, including what triggers their eruptions, and how can we predict when the next supervolcano will erupt?
• The most recent supereruption occurred in New Zealand about 26,000 years ago.
• Scientists have no way of predicting with perfect accuracy whether a supervolcano will occur in a given century, decade, or year – and that includes 2012.
• The odds if a supervolcano erupting in any given year is close to a million-to-one.
• There’s no sign of a supereruption looming anytime soon.

On that last point, given that scientists have never witnessed such an eruption, and they don’t know what triggers them, how do they know what to look for?

For those of us that believe there were advanced ancient civilizations that could do things like, say, build pyramids – 26,000 years ago is recent enough that the Taupo eruption might have been intelligently observed, and notes passed on. And 13 months is plenty of time for a supervolcano to kick-start itself.

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It looks like next in the series will be either Nibiru or pole shifts. I bet they either ignore magnetic pole shifts, or tell us they cannot happen suddenly (despite recent evidence to the contrary).

NASA Expert: No 2012 Supervolcano is a post from: 2012 Blog

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Models that have looked into the effects of a major meteorite impact have, until now, used a featuresless perfect sphere to represent Earth. A new model that incorporates the surface features of our planet has found:

…that the seismic waves resulting from the impact would have been scattered and unfocused, causing less severe ground displacement, tsunamis, and seismic and volcanic activity than previously thought.

So instead of the ripples in a swimming pool being quite uniform, we have ripples in say a small river, with some ducks, a fallen tree, and a pile of mud getting in the way. This means that there will be some areas, even reasonably close to the impact, that will survive intact. If there is ever going to be advanced warning of a large impact, such a model might be able to help humans choose the safest places to hide.

Uturuncu is an ancient volcano in southwest Bolivia. It last erupted 300,000 years ago, and that eruption does not classify it as a supervolcano. However, lately it is been giving indications that it could be a supervolcano in the making:

So far, they know the inflation is surprisingly fast: the center of the patch has risen 7.9 inches (20 centimeters) in the past 20 years. What is more, the uplift extends about 43 miles (70 kilometers) across — similar in size to the caldera that formed in the wake of the latest eruption of the Yellowstone supervolcano, which blanketed half of the U.S. in ash 640,000 years ago.

…Uturunca could be drawing magma from a dense swarm of nearby volcanoes, many of which are currently active.

The risk it currently presents depends on how long it has been inflating for, and satellite data only goes back 20 years. The investigating geologists say the expansion probably started only recently, and so the magma chamber probably has not yet grown to supervolcanic proportions, but also note that their initial conclusions are far from definitive.

Safety from Meteorites / New SuperVolcano? is a post from: 2012 Blog

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Image via Wikipedia

In 1815 Mount Tambora erupted, killing 90,000 locals and affecting the weather of the entire planet.

Aside from a few minor bursts in steam in the 1960s, the mountain has been quiet for much of the last 200 years. Gede Suantika of the government’s Center for Volcanology said activity first picked up in April, with the volcanic quakes jumping from less than five a month to more than 200.

“It also started spewing ash and smoke into the air, sometimes as high as 1,400 meters (4,600 feet),” he said. “That’s something I’ve never seen it do before.”

Authorities raised the alert to the second-highest level two weeks ago, but said only villagers within 2 miles (3 kilometers) from the crater needed to evacuate. [Washington Post]

In theory it takes more than 200 years for such a volcano to erupt with the same intensity as last time. So we probably shouldn’t be concerned…

Tambora Awakens is a post from: 2012 Blog

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The Daily Mail has an excellent article explaining the pros and cons of drilling into the supervolcano at the edge of Naples, and why scientists are concerned:

Now an international team, including scientists from the UK, wants to drill down inside the caldera to try to better understand exactly why part of it has risen 10ft since 1969. The area at the epicentre of the swelling has seen whole streets of houses crumble and collapse. The threat is imminent. The last time the ground rose like this (between 1430 and 1538) there was an eruption that caused the formation of a new volcano.

UPDATE, MAY 2012 – The Mayor of Naples has approved the drilling.

Naples Supervolcano – Should It Be Drilled? is a post from: 2012 Blog

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The risk from drilling into the Naples Supervolcano, planned to take place this month, has been averted for the time being. According to Newsweek:

The project has set off a passionate scientific and philosophical debate in a country where the idea of a volcano that could bury a city is more than just myth. Should they heed the rumblings under the earth and use science to evaluate the danger, possibly helping Naples avoid the tragedy that befell Pompeii? Or is it better not to tempt fate by drilling into the massive volcanic cauldron for fear that the work will disturb whatever combination of luck and geology has been keeping the city safe for thousands of years? The conflict has finally bubbled over, prompting the mayor of Naples, Rosa Russo Iervolino, to delay the start of the project and call a meeting this week in Rome to determine whether it’s safe to move forward.

…Benedetto De Vivo, a professor of geochemistry at the University of Naples, says probing the area could rattle the volcano, leading to earthquakes, explosions, and devastating pollution if noxious gases are inadvertently released from the caldera. “The risks here are enormous,” he tells NEWSWEEK. “You just don’t do an experiment like this in an urban area.”

Mayor Iervolino is torn. If she allows the drilling to go forward and there is so much as a slight tremor, she will forever be blamed for the carelessness of the decision. She says Naples has enough problems without the risk of man-made volcanic activity. Initially she signed off on the project, assuming that further research might protect the city from untold disaster, not cause it. But after hearing De Vivo’s concerns she delayed the drilling and called the meeting in Rome. “The civil-protection authorities must promise me that this will not put my city at risk,” she says. “Without that guarantee, there will be no drilling in any part of the caldera.”

Update on Naples Volcano Drilling is a post from: 2012 Blog

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Naples, Italy sits upon a supervolcano that supererupted just 39,000 years ago. It has been known for some time that scientists are planning to drill into the volcano, an act that some believe could trigger an eruption – in fact the concerns were published in New Scientist last year. Now dates have been set:

The project is due to start early next month, when the team will drill 1640ft into the ground at a site in Bagnoli, near Naples.

The second phase, due to start in the spring, will involve the drilling of a 4,000 metre deep borehole at the same location.

Naples Supervolcano: Drilling to commence soon is a post from: 2012 Blog

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I have a new article at Survive 2012 simply titled Supervolcanoes. If the 2012 event happens to be a supervolcano, or a supervolcanic eruption is triggered in 2012 by something else, then you need to be aware of just how catastrophic it can be…

Scientists have been discussing the possibility of the last supervolcanic eruption nearly wiping out the entire human species. According to New Scientist:

Toba is a supervolcano on the Indonesian island of Sumatra. It has blown its top many times but this eruption, 74,000 years ago, was exceptional. Releasing 2500 cubic kilometres of magma – nearly twice the volume of mount Everest – the eruption was more than 5000 times as large as the 1980 eruption of mount St Helens in the US, making it the largest eruption on Earth in the last 2 million years

Double the volume of Everest is a powerful and memorable statistic!

In theory (which is debated in the article), the aerosols “belched out” by Toba were such that our planet would have suffered a volcanic winter for 10 years or so. The devastation to flora and fauna would have made it difficult for humans to feed themselves, and the entire planet would have become a warzone with every species fighting over meals.

Modern humans, who were still thought to be living in Africa, would have been whittled down to just a few thousand breeding pairs scattered in dispersed refugia – creating a so-called “genetic bottleneck” in evolution. As the separate colonies developed independently of one another, they would have sown the seeds for the genetic differences between races once these separate groups eventually left Africa.

This is sobering:

The Geological Society of London’s working group went one step further in 2005 when they described the impact of a generic super-eruption. “An area the size of North America or Europe could be devastated, and pronounced deterioration of global climate would be expected for a few years following the eruption. Such events could result in the ruin of world agriculture, severe disruption of food supplies, and mass starvation. The effects could be sufficiently severe to threaten the fabric of civilisation,” they conclude.

A food shortage, regardless of cause, would have a domino effect. Western greed would most likely cause mass-starvation in poorer countries. Civil wars would be inevitable. Economies would collapse. Martial law would be commonplace, creating further problems. And a supervolcano could make this a reality tomorrow (or 50,000 years from now, nobody knows when).

SuperVolcanoes: A Very Real Threat is a post from: 2012 Blog

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