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Maria Box

@mariabox.bsky.social
191 followers 564 following 73 posts

PhD student at Northumbria University (UK), currently researching past climate in northern Mongolia. Generally excited by all speleothems great and small

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Maria Box @mariabox.bsky.social · 05/10/2026
i'm curious about the data source/methodology here. is this reliant on anonymous surveys or on the proportion of users who self-identify publicly as one gender vs another? anecdotally, women are more likely to conceal their gender on text-heavy websites, just because it's possible to do so there
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Dr Micha Campbell @michcampbell.fediscience.org.ap.brid.gy · 18/09/2026
New research suggests that the Indigenous population in Australia was >2 million before the invasion, and that 90% of the population died in the following 70 years. Sobering stuff. theconversation.com/more-than-2-mil…
theconversation.com
More than 2 million Indigenous people lived in Australia in 1788: new research
Genetic, archaeological and environmental evidence suggest the Indigenous population fell by more than 90% in the 70 years after the British invaded.
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Alex Spahn 🌋🌪️☄️ @spahn711.bsky.social · 11/09/2026
Allow me to make the case for why calcite should not only earn your vote but win the tournament. Calcite is the mineral with the most forms, is highly fluorescent & phosphorescent, helped explain the wave nature of light, laid the foundation for optics/polarizers, and even calms an upset tummy. A 🧵:
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Seb Breitenbach @speleoseb.bsky.social · 11/09/2026
I don’t have to tell you to vote #calcite! only viable option with it’s relevance for palaeontology, paleoclimatology, oceanography, geothermometry, carbon cycling, biogeochemistry… I could go on, but I guess you get the idea 🤩 A beautiful example from Sägistal 🇨🇭 @pucicu.de @scitobias.bsky.social
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IPCC @ipcc.bsky.social · 08/09/2026
📣 Registration is now open for experts to review the First Order Draft of the Working Group I contribution to IPCC’s Seventh Assessment Report. Experts can register until 25 Sept 2026 👉https://bit.ly/4vi25cq Review period 10 Aug to 2 Oct 🔗 bit.ly/WGI7Fod
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Maria Box @mariabox.bsky.social · 28/08/2026
And by 'friend' I mean 'myself in January when I'm panicking' 🤣
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Maria Box @mariabox.bsky.social · 28/08/2026
Oh gosh, apologies to all the lovely artists in my notes, but I was mostly just curious as to whether this is an established practice for researchers. I'll hold onto this post and people's details in case I reach my wits end with my thesis, but I am unfortunately a broke PhD student 🥲
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Maria Box @mariabox.bsky.social · 28/08/2026
Oh, I wouldn't trust anyone to draw the whole schematic for me! I had in mind something more like, asking someone to take my very sad MS paint drawings and make them prettier. I know exactly what I want my schematics to look like, but I sadly lack the time (and Illustrator license :P) to make them.
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Maria Box @mariabox.bsky.social · 28/08/2026
Genuine question: are there artists who draw scientific diagrams on commission? Has anyone ever done this for a paper they want to publish? As a researcher without an artistic bone in her body, the urge to just hire someone who actually knows what they're doing to make my schematics is so real.
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Seb Breitenbach @speleoseb.bsky.social · 24/07/2026
Less summer sea ice - more moisture in the air… 🤷 @mariabox.bsky.social @scitobias.bsky.social
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Kau))) @carbon8.bsky.social · 21/07/2026
🚨🚨We have a new paper out in @natgeosci.nature.com led by postdoctoral scholar Na Wang (now @ucsantabarbara.bsky.social), where we identify a last-millennium climate “seesaw” linking extreme #hydroclimate events across both Central Asia & mainland Southeast Asia ☔️ www.nature.com/articles/s41...
nature.com
Opposing hydroclimate extremes in Central and mainland Southeast Asia over past millennium - Nature Geoscience
Opposing wet and dry conditions in Central and mainland Southeast Asia over the past millennium were controlled by climate variability over the Pacific and Indian oceans, a pattern likely to become mo...
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Maria Box @mariabox.bsky.social · 07/07/2026
this site is khavtsgait, near lake erkhel in northern mongolia. we spent the last week travelling with our Mongolian colleagues in the post-ACOP field trip but parted ways today to do fieldwork. being here without them is a little melancholy, but I'm glad to be here nonetheless
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Maria Box @mariabox.bsky.social · 07/07/2026
2023 / 2026 what an incredible PhD journey I've had
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Maria Box @mariabox.bsky.social · 20/06/2026
I face the same problem as a scientist that I do as a caver... I'm irresistibly drawn towards very small niches.
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Maria Box @mariabox.bsky.social · 19/06/2026
I really think 2024 might've been the most fun I've ever had on fieldwork. Going without the team this year just won't be the same!
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Ola Kwiecien @olakwiecien3.bsky.social · 19/06/2026
Oh Maria! It definitely brings great memories back. The fun we had in- and outside caves. Amazing scientific and cultural experience! ⚒️🇲🇳
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Maria Box @mariabox.bsky.social · 19/06/2026
(Photo on the left is by A. Osintsev and features me struggling to navigate a hoarfrost-choked passage. This was my first real SRT experience inside of a cave and began with a 60 m descent through an ice-covered chute, so I was already exhausted! Right photo is by me, of D. Sokol'nikov.)
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Maria Box @mariabox.bsky.social · 19/06/2026
That @theguardian.com article inspired a #FieldworkFriday throwback from 2024: the frozen caves of northern Mongolia. These caves allow us to reconstruct permafrost conditions over thousands of years ago. With thaw occurring so rapidly today, understanding the long-term history is important!
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Maria Box @mariabox.bsky.social · 19/06/2026
www.theguardian.com/artanddesign... Very good piece on the rapidly changing world of permafrost in northern Mongolia. Very timely too, with the Asian Conference on Permafrost being held in Ulaanbaatar from next week!
theguardian.com
The changing face of Mongolia as, beneath the grass, permafrost thaws
The warming caused by climate breakdown in the landlocked east Asian country is transforming its fragile ecosystem
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Maria Box @mariabox.bsky.social · 11/06/2026
I guess after 80-something U-series dates during my PhD, I should start thinking about a U-series commitment
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Maria Box @mariabox.bsky.social · 11/06/2026
not that sort of dating, powerpoint 😅
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Dr Alice Paine @alicerpaine.bsky.social · 29/05/2026
🌋 New Paper 🌋 I’m thrilled to share our latest paper, out today in Nature Communications. All the manuscripts I write mean a lot to me, but this one feels particularly special. What a privilege to work with this team of co-authors on this topic. www.nature.com/articles/s41...
nature.com
Evidence for volcanic forcing of Holocene cold events - Nature Communications
This study shows that over 80% of Holocene glacier advances coincide with major eruptions, suggesting explosive volcanism could trigger long-lasting cooling through feedbacks involving the ocean, sea ...
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Ola Kwiecien @olakwiecien3.bsky.social · 21/05/2026
#dogsofbsky #academicbsky after listening to excellent talk by @mariabox.bsky.social about her work in Mongolian caves (do not be fooled, Pebble was all ears 😅) it is important to stretch your legs! @speleoseb.bsky.social ⚒️🇲🇳🌳🌲🐾💨🙂
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Plant Science Spotlight @plant-sci.bsky.social · 05/05/2026
Don’t reach for ChatGPT Images or Nano Banana as your first option when creating scientific images There are multiple free and open-source images, icons, and tools for creating scientific illustrations. #plantscience @stephenturner.us blog.stephenturner.us/p/free-open-...
blog.stephenturner.us
Free and open-source images, icons, and tools for creating scientific illustrations
Phylopic, NIH Bioart, Bioicons, Scidraw, Open Science Art, Health Icons, Servier Medical Art, Biodiversity Heritage Library, the Noun Project, Segment Anything, Excalidraw, draw.io, Biographics
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FuzzWolf 🏳️‍🌈 @fuzzwolf.bsky.social · 25/04/2026
Saw this meme and I did it. Opening line to Neuromancer.
Centered text reads “The sky above
the port was the color of television, tuned to a dead channel”

Below are 3 versions of the same cityscape labeled 1985, 2005, 2025 with the background changing from grey static, to solid blue, to streaming service logos.
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Simon Hammann @simonhammann.bsky.social · 20/04/2026
Don't be shy to take on a little two-week side project. These five months will be the most precious three years of your academic journey.
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Earth Archives @eartharchives.org · 22/04/2026
A rediscovered tracksite in northern Mongolia shows large dinosaurs ranged there 120 million years ago, extending their known geographic reach. Image credit: Okayama University of Science phys.org/news/2026-04... #fossils #paleontology
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Charles Thistlethwaite @charlest.bsky.social · 05/04/2026
New laboratory experiments from the University of Leeds shows that thawing permafrost can become 25 to 100 times more permeable, allowing greenhouse gases to escape into the atmosphere much more easily than when frozen. www.earth.com/news/thawing...
earth.com
Study shows thawing permafrost releases much more greenhouse gas than expected
Thawing permafrost emissions could accelerate climate change as Arctic soils become 25x to 100x more permeable, releasing much more gas.
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Dr. Thomas Ronge @thomasronge.bsky.social · 03/04/2026
New 🌎 just dropped! Just look how thin and fragile our atmosphere is! And also the aurora! Amazing. www.nasa.gov/image-articl...
NASA astronaut and Artemis II Commander Reid Wiseman took this picture of Earth from the Orion spacecraft’s window after completing the translunar injection burn. There are two auroras (top right and bottom left) and zodiacal light (bottom right) is visible as the Earth eclipses the Sun.
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Maria Box @mariabox.bsky.social · 03/04/2026
Branden-boar-g? 🐖
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Maria Box @mariabox.bsky.social · 03/04/2026
This month, be patient with your colleages who don't always get what you mean when you first say it, ask odd questions, or express themselves badly. Be patient with the awkward people. Some people's brains just work differently. It ultimately makes the world a rich and interesting place
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Maria Box @mariabox.bsky.social · 03/04/2026
Oh it's Autism Acceptance Month? Hi, I'm a PhD student with ASD. From dyspraxia (clinical clumsiness) making certain lab tasks tricky, to always interpreting instructions too literally, it's not always easy. But my love of small repetitive tasks certainly helps with weighing out for the irms 😂
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Maria Box @mariabox.bsky.social · 25/03/2026
Took a day trip to see the pictish carvings in Wemyss Caves, Scotland. Such a special, spectacular site, sadly under threat from vandalism and coastal erosion; if you're in the area, I highly recommend a visit!
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Maria Box @mariabox.bsky.social · 24/03/2026
This is genuinely surprising. If the UK had a system like the Deutschland Ticket I would be taking train journeys every evening for fun
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Sayak Basu @sayakbasu.bsky.social · 19/03/2026
Join our session: “ *Bridging Proxy Records and Climate Models: Toward Robust Paleoclimate Insights Across Timescales* ” We invite contributions tackling the mismatch between proxy records and climate model simulations—one of the key challenges in paleoclimate science.
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Maria Box @mariabox.bsky.social · 13/03/2026
mines a kangaroo. my first easter in Australia was spent trying to remove a kangaroo from our house. it's doable but takes some teamwork 😅 emus on the other hand are impossible to remove from anywhere. you cant chase them out, they're too dumb to understand what a door is.
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Zack Labe @zacklabe.com · 13/03/2026
Trends in March temperatures over land areas for the last 50 years... Data from NOAAGlobalTemp v6.0.0 (www.ncei.noaa.gov/products/lan...)
Global map showing surface air temperature trends for each March from 1976 to 2025. Only land areas are shown. Red shading is shown for warmer temperature trends, and blue shading is shown for colder temperature trends. Data is from NOAA/NESDIS/NCEI NOAAGlobalTempv6.0.0. The temperature trend scale is from -0.5°C/decade to +0.5°C/decade. Most all areas are warming, except for parts of Antarctic and north America.
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Seb Breitenbach @speleoseb.bsky.social · 12/03/2026
Have some Free Time! small print: use Free Time responsibly! @olakwiecien3.bsky.social @drjosephgraly.bsky.social @mariabox.bsky.social
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Seb Breitenbach @speleoseb.bsky.social · 08/03/2026
Paper alert ‼️ 🧪Our very own Dr Jade Margerum just published her 2nd PhD paper on International Women’s Day! 💐🌻🌹🌷 15 years of monitoring of #Botovskaya Cave in #Siberia! Kudos to our women & an amazing team! @olakwiecien3.bsky.social @annabelwolf.bsky.social digitalcommons.usf.edu/ijs/vol54/is...
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Maria Box @mariabox.bsky.social · 04/03/2026
I guess what ultimately confuses me is that the parts AI promises to automate away-- reading, writing, formulating theories, coming up with new ideas-- are the parts of research I most enjoy. Yes, they frustrate me to the point of tears sometimes, but overcoming it and producing science is... fun!
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Maria Box @mariabox.bsky.social · 04/03/2026
"To exercise one’s capacities to their fullest extent is to take pleasure in one’s own existence[...] Life is an end in itself. And if what being alive actually consists of is having powers [...] then surely the exercise of such powers as an end in itself does not have to be explained either."
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Maria Box @mariabox.bsky.social · 04/03/2026
Lately, in the face of the AI debate and struggling to wrestle my own data into manuscript format, my thoughts keep coming back to this essay on play, thought and existence by David Graeber. thebaffler.com/salvos/whats...
thebaffler.com
What’s the Point If We Can’t Have Fun?
My friend June Thunderstorm and I once spent a half an hour sitting in a meadow by a mountain lake, watching an inchworm dangle from the top of a stalk of grass, twist about in every possible…
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Aparna Nair @disabilitystor1.bsky.social · 03/03/2026
okay, Ill bite. What do you think the point of reading for and writing a literature review is? The process of reading and writing is crucial for THINKING. Your ideas are shaped by all of this, offloading it to gAI, no matter how "good" you think gAI is at it defeats the purpose entirely.
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Michael E. Mann @michaelemann.bsky.social · 03/03/2026
"Holocene Hydroclimatic Variations Over Western and Central Asia as Inferred From Speleothem Isotope Evidence" | Pleased to be among the authors of this new article in @agu.org #JGRatmos led by my former student Liang Ning: agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1029/...
agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com
Holocene Hydroclimatic Variations Over Western and Central Asia as Inferred From Speleothem Isotope Evidence
Enriching δ18Op trend over WA and ACA with precipitation decreases over WA and WCA but increases over ECA during the Holocene These δ18Op enrichments mainly result from decreases in precipitation...
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Maria Box @mariabox.bsky.social · 23/02/2026
my folks in Alice Springs are already dealing with flooding and supermarket shortages as major highways are cut off 😬 shame that the most remote, understudied regions are left the most vulnerable as global heating continues
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Dr Matt Pope @mattpope.bsky.social · 14/02/2022
From the depths of the Ice Age, there's nothing quite as romantic as mammoth. Cueva El Pindal, Asturias. 🦣♥️
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Dr. Ramesh Glückler @rglueckler.bsky.social · 06/02/2026
Our recent publication featured in @awi.de news! 🔥 Full paper currently available as in press here: www.nature.com/articles/s43... Will share more on it once the final version is online 🧪⚒️🌏
nature.com
Human activity may have influenced Holocene wildfire dynamics in boreal eastern Siberia - Communications Earth & Environment
In eastern Siberia, climate alone cannot explain Late Holocene wildfire dynamics, and human activity is a potential driver of shorter, multi-centennial-scale variability of wildfire since c. 5000 year...
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INSTAAR @instaar.bsky.social · 04/02/2026
🌡️ A sediment record millions of years old revealed that the tropical Andes heated up dramatically when atmospheric CO2 levels were similar to today’s www.colorado.edu/today/2026/0... Lina Pérez-Angel (now at Brown U) & Julio Sepúlveda led the team.
colorado.edu
Some tropical land may experience stronger-than-expected warming under climate change
A sediment record millions of years old revealed that the tropical Andes heated up dramatically when atmospheric CO2 levels were similar to today’s.
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Dr. Evan J. Gowan @evangowan.bsky.social · 25/01/2026
A new web interface for Berger et al's insolation calculator has been released. Check it out! django.elic.ucl.ac.be/berger/insol...
django.elic.ucl.ac.be
Berger Insolation Calculator
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Ola Kwiecien @olakwiecien3.bsky.social · 20/01/2026
If anyone needs a BOOP, Pebble is right here for you! He is a professional BOOPer #TerrierTuesday
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