More and more scientists are using Google Earth to visualize and share with the public the phenomena they study, according to an article in the July issue of Popular Science.
The magazine describes several projects that incorporate the free software. Among them: a scientist at the University of Alaska uses it with tools he developed to monitor ash plumes from volcanoes in the North Pacific so that planes can keep away from danger, NASA has been using Google Earth to follow research flights into storms and help direct them toward areas of interest, researchers at the National Snow and Ice Data Center at the University of Colorado have produced tools to illustrate their results from monitoring snow and ice in both poles, and a scientist at Ohio State University uses Google Earth to show the spread of the avian-flu virus. —Maria José Viñas
