Water Archives - The Sciku Project

January 15, 2026January 15, 2026

Russian Peat Corer by Mack Baysinger

But seriously
How to get soil in a tube
Give us strength, peat gods
by Mack Baysinger

In the first field campaign of my PhD thesis work, myself and another PhD student spent six weeks in Finland at the Hyytiälä Forest Research Station to collect daily (well, near-daily) gas and water samples from a nearby peatland.

Peatland soils are interesting to climate researchers because they are absolutely chock-full of carbon. The waterlogged and acidic conditions of peatlands means that at the end of the growing season the plants die, but they do not fully decompose. Unless they are disturbed, peatlands will continue to layer new plant growth in the summer on top of what’s left of the previous years growing seasons. All this layering adds up; peat currently represents approximately a third of the world’s soil carbon, despite peatlands only covering 3% of the world’s surface.

In addition to the gas and water samples, we had also planned a full day of work to collect soil cores from the peatland that would later be used for incubation experiments. In the sterile conditions of the lab, I would be able to test which environmental factors (such as temperature) drive the rate of anaerobic carbon dioxide production in peatland soils.

This ‘full-day’ of work we had planned for stretched to almost a full week as weather delays, missing or broken soil coring equipment, other time-sensitive measurements, and the ooey gooey nature of wetland soils tested our resolve.

Nevertheless, with a Russian Peat Corer we had found at the very back of the research station’s equipment room, we were able to collect a full set of precious peat cores.

Further reading:

The field work behind this sciku resulted in a publication in Boreal Environment Research. The main finding of this paper is that one type of vegetation that is key to peat formation (Sphagnum moss) had the highest anaerobic CO2 potential production at mid-to-low temperatures:

Baysinger, Mackenzie R., et al. “Warmer Sphagnum moss, less soil carbon loss: Anaerobic respiration and temperature response along a boreal forest-peatland ecotone.” Boreal Environment Research 30 (2025): 1-20. https://doi.org/10.58013/ber2025.1eyn-rn68

Our field site, Siikaneva bog, is the site of many ongoing scientific efforts from research groups all over the world. Linked here are short videos of our lab group giving ‘tours’ of the bog: https://www.awi.de/en/science/geosciences/permafrost-research/research-focus/energy-and-waterbalance/galleries/finland-2022.html

The type of corer in this Sci-ku is a ‘peat corer’. Here is a ‘how-to’ video from the WWF: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OfO0gtP8ru4

Or a slightly more realistic ‘how-to’ video (ankle deep in wet soil, wearing a hi-visibility vest):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VeOjbfzyNtc

Author bio:

Mack Baysinger (she/they) is a PhD student with the Alfred Wegener Institute in Potsdam, Germany. Her thesis work explores high-latitude biogeochemical cycling, with a focus on peatland and permafrost systems. She can be found on Bluesky @mack-baysinger.bsky.social

November 20, 2025November 20, 2025

A Little Pain Goes a Long Way by Maryam Imogen Ghouth

Too much water drowns.
Yet, windstorms force trees to grow.
We must ache to rise.
by Maryam Imogen Ghouth

Plant physiology research shows that while water is essential for growth, excessive water can drown a plant by suffocating its roots. Conversely, mechanical stress from wind and storms can actually stimulate stronger, deeper root systems and sturdier trunks. This paradox mirrors human adversity—it can foster growth, while overprotection can hinder it.

Further reading:

‘Waterlogging stress in plants: Unraveling the mechanisms and impacts on growth, development, and productivity’, 2024, Manghwar, H., et al., Environmental and Experimental Botany, available: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envexpbot.2024.105824

‘Mechanosensing and Plant Growth Regulators Elicited During the Thigmomorphogenetic Response’, 2021, Telewski, F.W., Frontiers in Forests and Global Change, available: https://doi.org/10.3389/ffgc.2020.574096

Author bio:

Maryam Imogen Ghouth is a literary artist working across written, audio, and visual poetry. Her work has appeared in several literary journals, including Sky Island and Last Leaves, and in award-winning films, such as Under the Sun. Her films, including Not Alone, have been awarded at over 30 film festivals.

Find out more at www.maryamghouth.com and follow Maryam on Instagram here: https://www.instagram.com/maryamghouth

Read more sciku by Maryam: ‘Rejection’ and ‘This Battle is Inborn’.

June 5, 2025June 5, 2025

Ice by John Hawkhead

a deep understanding
of the chemistry of ice
cracks in our matrix
by John Hawkhead

Whilst the poem above was written by the author, the below background to it was provided by Google AI:

Ice as a Matrix

Ice, the frozen form of water, can act as a matrix or a medium to hold other substances in place.

Applications:

Cryopreservation: Ice matrices are used in cryopreservation techniques to freeze and preserve biological samples by embedding them in ice, which helps to minimize ice crystal formation and damage to the samples.

Material Science: Ice matrices can be used for encapsulating or embedding materials for research purposes, such as studying the properties of materials in a frozen state or for creating composite materials.

Protein Analysis: Ice matrices are used in techniques like IR-MALDI (Infrared Matrix-Assisted Laser Desorption/Ionization) to analyze proteins in frozen samples.

Film Production: Matrix-assisted pulsed laser evaporation (MAPLE) uses water ice as a matrix for producing thin films of materials like polyethylene glycol (PEG).

Further reading:

‘Structure of Ice’, LibreTexts Chemistry, available: https://chem.libretexts.org/Bookshelves/Introductory_Chemistry/Introductory_Chemistry_(CK-12)/15%3A_Water/15.02%3A_Structure_of_Ice

‘Chemistry of Ice’, 2020, NBC News Learn, YouTube, available: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aQOTV8d6QLA

‘Structures of Ice’, 2025, Zumdahl, S.S., Encyclopaedia Britannica, available: https://www.britannica.com/science/water/Structures-of-ice

Author bio:

John Hawkhead (@haikuhawk.bsky.social) is a writer and artist from the south-west of England. His work has been published globally over the last 25 years, including three books of haiku / senryu: ‘Small Shadows’ and ‘Bone Moon’ (available from Alba Publishing. http://www.albapublishing.com/) and ‘Four Horse Parable’ (available from Nun Prophet Press).

Read more of John’s sciku here!

March 2, 2023March 9, 2023

Precipitation by Sally Quon

precipitation –
an atmospheric river
freezing as it falls
by Sally Quon

I first heard the term ‘atmospheric river’ in 2021 when my region was hit by one or more. Roads were washed out, landslides, farms flooded and livestock destroyed. This winter another atmospheric river formed and descended upon us, but this time in the form of snow.

Further reading:

‘Minister’s statement on one-year anniversary of atmospheric river’, Government of British Columbia: https://news.gov.bc.ca/releases/2022EMBC0063-001700

‘Atmospheric River’, Wikipedia article: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atmospheric_river

Author bio:

Sally Quon is a disabled writer from the Okanagan Valley in beautiful British Columbia. She actively engages in photography, creative non-fiction, and poetry, including a budding interest in Japanese short forms. She is a member of Haiku Canada and an associate member of the League of Canadian Poets. You can find out more about Sally here: https://featherstone-creative.com and follow her on Twitter @QuonSal l y

September 16, 2022September 17, 2022

Diamond Rain

Does Neptune ever
feel lonely, with a wall of
diamonds round it’s heart?

Diamonds might be precious but they’re composed of carbon, an element that’s common here on Earth and throughout the universe.

Under the right conditions (pressure and heat) carbon turns into diamonds. Marvin Ross predicted in 1981 that such conditions might be found in the mantels of the Solar System’s ice giants, Neptune and Uranus.

Recent research has supported this, with laser shock experiments on polystyrene performed by Kraus et al. (2017) replicating the conditions approximately 10,000km below the surfaces of Neptune and Uranus. Their experiments created nanodiamonds, supporting evidence that diamond precipitation occurs in the mantels of these planets.

Now further research has strengthened this evidence. The earlier studies used pure hyrdrocarbon systems (polystyrene is C₈H₈) but the interiors of Neptune and Uranus are more complex than that, consisting mainly of a dense fluid mixture of water (H₂O), methane (CH₄), and ammonia (NH₃).

To understand diamond formation under more complex conditions similar to those found on Neptune and Uranus, Zhiyu et al. (2022) investigated diamond formation using polyethylene terephthalate (PET) plastics (C₁₀H₈O₄). The researchers found that diamond formation is likely to be enhanced by the presence of oxygen, which in their research accelerated the splitting of the carbon and hydrogen.

Under the conditions found on Neptune and Uranus it’s likely that much larger diamonds would be formed, potentially millions of carats in weight. Over millennia these vast diamonds are predicted to sink slowly through the icy layers of the mantel before melting near the cores, creating an ever changing layer of diamonds around the cores of the planets.

The latest research may also explain another peculiarity about Neptune and Uranus: their unusual magnetic fields. Under the conditions that form diamonds in the mantel, the researchers also found evidence that superionic water might be created. Superionic water conducts electric current and is likely to impact the planets’ magnetic fields.

In addition to learning more about the Universe, there are practical implications for us on Earth resulting from the research too. Nanodiamonds have a range of important uses, including in medical sensors, non-invasive surgery, sustainable manufacturing, and quantum electronics. This latest research points the way towards a new way of fabricating nanodiamonds for such uses.

Attachment

muscles need iron
so do mussels it appears
such sticky anchors

Iron is an essential element for almost all living organisms. The majority of iron in mammals is found in red blood cells (haemoglobin) and muscle cells (myoglobin), supporting the transport, storage and release of oxygen. In humans, iron deficiency is the most common nutritional deficiency in the world and can lead to iron-deficiency anaemia, symptoms of which include fatigue, headaches, weakness, angina, breathlessness, complications during pregnancy and delayed growth in infants and children.

Iron is also important for many animals, utilised to help strengthen hard materials such as rodent teeth or the carbonate armour of some gastropods. Yet iron can be found in soft biological materials too, including the sticky anchors that mussels use to attach to rocks and the threads that connect those adhesives to the mussels’ inner tissues.

To investigate the importance of iron in mussel anchors, Hamada et al. (2020) varied seawater iron levels in a controlled environment and examined adhesive thread samples from Blue mussels (Mytilus edulis) which had been living in the water for 3 days. The researchers measured thread strength by securing the entire length of the threads and measuring how much force was required to pull them until the adhesive failed.

Adhesive strength increased as the iron level of the water increased until an optimal amount was reached, after which the adhesive strength declined. Examination of the plaques themselves also revealed differences in morphology, including colour and microstructural features, arising from the different iron levels of the water.

The results confirm that iron is a key component of how mussels anchor themselves to rocks and demonstrate how changing ocean chemistry might affect these molluscs in the future.

Further reading: https://doi.org/10.1021/acs.est.0c02392

March 1, 2019March 1, 2019

Mars

If you say water
then we say volcanism,
else Mars is too cold.

Recent observations of Mars have suggested the presence of liquid water beneath the ice at the South Pole, prompting researchers to ask how water could exist in liquid state under Mars’ environmental conditions.

Research by Soria and Bramson (2019) suggests that the most likely theory to explain the presence of water would be an underground source of heat such as the formation of a magma chamber in the area within the past few hundred thousand years. The researchers also suggest the reverse is true – if there isn’t such a heat source then it’s unlikely that the earlier suggestions of liquid water are correct.

Original reseach: http://dx.doi.org/10.1029/2018GL080985