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John P. Rafferty
John P. Rafferty
Encyclopædia Britannica Editor
Connect with John P. Rafferty
BIOGRAPHY

John P. Rafferty writes about Earth processes and the environment. He serves currently as the editor of Earth and life sciences, covering climatology, geology, zoology, and other topics that relate to the natural world. Prior to joining Encyclopaedia Britannica in 2006, he held teaching positions at Lewis University, Roosevelt University, and the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

Primary Contributions (464)
Black widow
9 of the World’s Deadliest Spiders
More than 51,500 different species of spiders are found in the world. Of these, only a small number are said to be dangerous, and less than 30 (less than one-tenth of one percent) have been responsible for human deaths. Why are so few spiders harmful to humans? Much of the reason may result from…
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Saffir-Simpson hurricane scale
How Do Scientists Predict Tsunamis After Earthquakes?
What Causes Tsunamis?
Japan earthquake and tsunami of 2011
Greenland shark
Central Texas floods of 2025
Challenger Deep
Sylvia Earle
Richter scale
Texas hold’em
flash flood
megalodon
Hurricane Irene
Hurricane Ian
Hurricane Helene
Super Typhoon Haiyan
Superstorm Sandy
How Do Hurricanes Get Their Names?
Factors Affecting Hurricane Development in the Atlantic Ocean
Margaret Morse Nice
the Pretenders
Little Ice Age
Nile crocodile
Asiatic lion
American alligator
Is the Number of Hurricanes Increasing?
brontosaurus
Howard Dean
Jolly Roger
9 of the World’s Deadliest Snakes
American robin
Tyrannosaurus rex
titanosaur
Famous Mustaches in History
Women’s March
Kirtland’s warbler
harpy eagle
Barbary lion
Why Do Dogs Circle Before They Lie Down?
heat wave
cod fishery collapse of 1992
the Go-Go’s
M. Night Shyamalan
Asian elephant
How Do Cockroaches Breathe?
How Do We Know That Dinosaurs May Have Had Feathers?
Is Earth Going to Change the Direction in Which It Rotates?
What Is the Most Aerodynamic Animal?
What Is the Difference Between a Typhoon and a Super Typhoon?
Why Does the Tropic of Cancer’s Location on Earth Move Over Time?
Where Did the -stan Country Name Suffix Come From?
Why Are Elephants’ Ears So Big?
Do Hurricanes Happen on Other Planets?
Is It True That Squirrels Forget Where They Bury About Half of Their Food?
The Perils of an Early Spring
Saving Sharks in the 2020s
How Do We Know What Dinosaurs Sounded Like?
How Do Ocean Currents Affect the Biosphere?
Why Do Our Noses Have Two Nostrils?
Why Do Animals Have Tails?
Can Anything Break if You Hit It Hard Enough?
Why Are Some Metals More Conductive than Others?
Why Is Predicting the Weather So Difficult for Meteorologists?
What Are Matrices Used For?
How Do Chameleons Change Colour?
What Is the Difference Between a Meteotsunami, a Seiche, and a Storm Surge?
Why Does the United States Have More Tornadoes than Any Other Country?
Is Light Pollution Really Pollution?
Why Are the Babies of Mammals Cute?
What Happens to Earth If the Amazon Rainforest Is Completely Burned?
What Causes a Volcano to Erupt?
Did Dinosaurs Really Have Feathers?
Why Don’t Birds Have Teeth?
Why Are Sloths So Slow?
What were the circumstances that surrounded Roald Amundsen’s death?
The Anthropocene Epoch: Adding Humans to the Chart of Geologic Time
What’s the Difference Between Global Warming and Climate Change?
How Does the Human Body Maintain Its Temperature?
What Is the Difference Between Primary and Secondary Ecological Succession?
Why Does -saur Appear So Often in Dinosaur Names?
The Rise of the Machines: Pros and Cons of the Industrial Revolution
What Purposes Do Mosquitoes Serve in Ecosystems?
What Happened to the Megalodon?
What Is Gerrymandering?
Which Waters Do You Pass Through When You “Sail the Seven Seas”?
Why Is the Sky Blue?
What Is an Aftershock?
What’s the Difference Between Rabbits and Hares?
Why Does Water Freeze from the Top Down?
Do Fossil Fuels Really Come from Fossils?
Do Toilets in Different Hemispheres Flush in Different Directions?
Is the Ozone Layer Finally Healing Itself?
What is Hexavalent Chromium (or Chromium-6)?
Why Do You Have to Turn Off Electronic Devices on an Airplane?
How Do Deserts Form?
What Was the Little Ice Age?
Just How Many Oceans Are There?
What’s the Difference Between Weather and Climate?
What Causes the Northern and Southern Lights?
How Did the Sperm Whale Get Its Name?
Why Do Airlines Overbook Seats on Flights?
How Do You Tell the Difference Between Total, Annular, Solar, and Lunar Eclipses?
Is Climate Change Real?
Are There Laws on the High Seas?
What’s the Difference Between Venomous and Poisonous?
11 of the World’s Most Famous Warplanes
9 of the World’s Deadliest Mammals
15 of the Best Birdsongs (According to Britannica)
A Journey Through Time Since the Precambrian
9 Infamous Assassins and the World Leaders They Dispatched
Prince Philip: A Life in Pictures
Gorilla gorilla, Sula sula, and Other Animals Whose Names Are Tautonyms—the Same for Genus and Species
6 Fast Facts about Alexander Graham Bell
7 Crocodilian Species That Are Dangerous to Humans
Where Did the Moon Come From?
6 Lakes That Are Drying Up
8 of the World’s Most-Remote Islands
Beyond Pi: 7 Underrated Single-Letter Variables and Constants
What Darwin Got Right (and Wrong) About Evolution
10 of the World’s Most Dangerous Fish
7 of the World’s Most Dangerous Lizards and Turtles
5 Vertebrate Groups
Exploring 7 of Earth’s Great Mountain Ranges
5 Notorious Greenhouse Gases
The 6 Deadliest Earthquakes Since 1950
Fast Facts about the Cell Membrane
In the Sea-Language: Sailing Terms in Britannica’s First Edition
6 of the World’s Most Dangerous Birds
9 of the Biggest Oil Spills in History
The Great Molasses Flood and 6 Other Strange Disasters
Titanosaurs: 8 of the World’s Biggest Dinosaurs
Five Years Later: The Great Sendai Earthquake
35th Anniversary of Mount Saint Helens Eruption
When Katrina Struck
A Recent History of Climate Change
Mount Tambora 200 Years Later
Spotting a Supercontinent: How Pangea Was Discovered
An Inconvenient Truth: 10 Years Hence
Deepwater Horizon Disaster: Five Years Later
Super Bowl Sunday: An Unofficial Holiday
Coral Bleaching: A Threat to Our Reefs
Japan Maneuvers to Skirt Whaling Restrictions
Returning to a Galaxy Far, Far Away
America’s Boomer Generation
Cheating Death on Everest
A Look at Hong Kong and China 20 Years After Reunification
U.S. Exits Paris Climate Agreement
Smothered in Drought
Thomas Malthus’s 250th Birthday
A Tale of Two Submerged Continents
“Mr. Gorbachev, Tear Down This Wall!”: Reagan’s Berlin Speech
Are You Ready for Some Fantasy Football?
What Happened to Acid Rain?
A Trillion Tonnes of Antarctica Fell into the Sea
The Naked Mole Rat’s Latest Superpower
Nuclear Exclusion Zones
Just How Old Is Homo sapiens?
Art Restoration: Beyond Canvas
From Pirate to Admiral: The Tale of Barbarossa
The 40th Anniversary of Star Wars
Ocean Acidification: How Carbon Dioxide Is Hurting the Seas
Horseshoe Crab: A Key Player in Ecology, Medicine, and More
Measuring the Reign of Homo naledi
great tit
pileated woodpecker
biodiversity loss
Eyjafjallajökull volcano
Keystone pipeline
the Cars
Mary Anning
apex predator
emperor penguin
National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
Anthropocene Epoch
gavial
water moccasin
ice storm
Magellanic penguin
Los Angeles wildfires of 2025
Nepal earthquake of 2015
Muscovy duck
the Cure
lynx
Carcharodontosaurus
Gigantopithecus
Beer’s law
Hurricane Andrew
barred owl
spotted owl
anaconda
Podokesaurus
sea level rise
March Madness Mascot Challenge
Myanmar earthquake of 2025
Fagradalsfjall volcano
American crocodile
Jason Momoa
timber rattlesnake
Florida panther
Burmese python
great blue heron
rogue wave
Lake Vostok
Zavaritzki caldera
spectacled caiman
Cuvier’s dwarf caiman
Keeling Curve
Martins Dukurs
Julia Alvarez
reticulated python
Homo sapiens sapiens
invasive species
Endangered Species Act
Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation
Francisco J. Ayala
Miller-Urey experiment
John M. Jumper
desertification
Emma Lucy Braun
Marcel Hirscher
directors of the Federal Bureau of Investigation
Chile earthquake of 2010
Inge Lehmann
black panther
marine protected area
Papahānaumokuākea Marine National Monument
blue-footed booby
Santa Ana winds
New Madrid earthquakes of 1811–12
slender-billed curlew
Hadean Eon
derecho
dwarf crocodile
mugger
Orinoco crocodile
Super Outbreak of 2011
Jeanne Villepreux-Power
global warming policy
kori bustard
painted redstart
Stevie Ray Vaughan
ocean warming
Philippine eagle
velvet-purple coronet
Maui wildfires of 2023
Perry Chen
common yellowthroat
Lee Berger
decarbonization
Heisman Trophy winners
American goldfinch
Mária Telkes
liger
Caspian seal
John F. Clauser
pacu
Ruth Patrick
Australian little penguin
Baikal seal
NASCAR Cup champions
goliath frog
Amundsen Sea
whale vocalization
Mick Jagger
blue penguin
Daniel Lieberman
Klaus Hasselmann
Margaret Bryan Davis
Andrew Mason
Patrick Matthew
Van earthquake of 2011
Demis Hassabis
Mount Ruang
Michael Stonebraker
Pakistan floods of 2022
list of U.S. state birds
Manabe Syukuro
Thwaites Glacier
megacity
Hosain Rahman
Libya flooding of 2023
Morocco earthquake of 2023
Ted Ligety
Cyclone Pam
Christchurch earthquakes of 2010–11
Tangshan earthquake of 1976
moment magnitude
soil liquefaction
Louis Brus
Steve Easterbrook
salmon shark
crocodile shark
cookiecutter shark
zebra shark
Ezra Taft Benson
James Lovelock
Pierre Agostini
dust
sea dragon
Daniel G. Nocera
Donald Johanson
Alain Aspect
Joe Trippi
Anton Zeilinger
Svante Pääbo
freshwater crocodile
Michelle Howard
Sichuan earthquake of 2008
Linger brothers
Kahramanmaraş earthquake of 2023
polymer banknote
Osborn’s dwarf crocodile
West African crocodile
false gharial
black caiman
ocean acidification
Morelet’s crocodile
Cuban crocodile
Chinese alligator
Siamese crocodile
Philippine crocodile
How deep is the ocean?
How Old Is Earth?
urban sprawl
lag phase
megamouth shark
atmospheric river
North Atlantic Oscillation
subglacial lake
western diamondback rattlesnake
chemical equator
Big Hole
Egyptian goose
Mount Marapi
Fender Stratocaster
Novarupta
hemisphere
puff adder
great Indian bustard
World Oceans Day
Morocco earthquake of 2023: At a Glance
bomb cyclone
martial eagle
sand tiger shark
Irukandji jellyfish
member states of the Commonwealth
ice sheet
habitat loss
geographic range
biosphere reserve
species richness
Thorndike’s law of effect
hurricane intensity scales
world’s longest rivers
world’s largest lakes
world’s largest islands
Africa Cup of Nations winners
world’s largest dams
world’s major volcanoes
world’s largest deserts
Indianapolis 500 winner
Postcards from the 6th Mass Extinction
Fender Telecaster
bilby
texture
Adélie penguin
Nazca Plate
Rankine temperature scale
medieval warm period
ocean thermal energy conversion
National Weather Service
Rodinia
Tonian Period
Cryogenian Period
coevolution
Australopithecus sediba
Sahul
fish owl
K-selected species
r-selected species
gentoo penguin
crurotarsan
yellow-eyed penguin
Fiordland penguin
vervet
royal penguin
Elysia chlorotica
common clown fish
erect-crested penguin
macaroni penguin
chinstrap penguin
kipunji
Humboldt penguin
Galapagos penguin
king penguin
quetzal
rockhopper penguin
African penguin
brown tree snake
aftershock
cryoseism
Coral Triangle
coral bleaching
India-Pakistan heat wave of 2015
frugivore
volcanic winter
Homerian Stage
Telychian Stage
Sheinwoodian Stage
Wilkins Ice Shelf
regolith
bedrock
Ediacaran Period
Teshekpuk Lake
polar vortex
Snares penguin
Barbados threadsnake
maritime continent
Katian Stage
Aeronian Stage
Roadian Stage
Wordian Stage
Capitanian Stage
Wuchiapingian Stage
Tahina palm
pliosaur
Ludfordian Stage
Jiangshanian Stage
Dapingian Stage
Gelasian Stage
Chengjiang fossil site
Dreadnoughtus
Katla
Hirnantian Stage
Sandbian Stage
Rhuddanian Stage
Paibian Stage
Gorstian Stage
Guzhangian Stage
Floian Stage
Fortunian Stage
Changhsingian Stage
Drumian Stage
Charrier coffee
gyre
back-arc basin
Ionian Stage
Tarantian Stage
kimberlite eruption
hypsometry