Yahoo! aggregates the billions of searches performed across Yahoo! properties to give the pulse on what people are thinking and talking about. Searches represent the people, an instant poll every moment of the day, looking into the fleeting moods and entrenched attitudes of Internet users across the world. Each week Yahoo! Web Life Editor Heather Cabot explores these trends on local and national broadcast. The Japan earthquake and tsunami dominated searches this week on Yahoo!.

Japan Crisis
The crisis in Japan continues to dominate searches on Yahoo!. It’s been more than a week since the 8.9 earthquake and tsunami wreaked havoc on the island nation. The rescue and recovery efforts coupled with the threat of nuclear disaster sent online to find real time photos, videos and the latest news.

Yahoo! users wanted to know more about the threat of radiation exposure and how it’s treated. After multiple explosions rocked the Fukushima power plant, searches for preventive measures, including, potassium iodide tablets spiked 150%. People wanted to understand how far radiation can travel, which other countries could be affected and they also looked back at the history of other nuclear disasters such as Chernobyl and Three Mile Island. In addition to finding out how to help, concerned citizens also sought information on how to prepare for emergencies in their own homes. Searches for emergency kits ramped up across the web this week.

To learn more about how you can make a difference, visit Yahoo!’s How to Help page.

March Madness
March Madness provided a lighter topic to talk about around the water cooler, this week. The teams folks seem to be rooting for most are Ohio, Duke and BYU. Fans are busy focusing on their brackets – searches for NCAA are up 109,000%. The states most interested in the tournament according to search are Ohio, Illinois and California, Michigan and Pennsylvania.

Fans can fill out brackets at Yahoo! Tourney Pick’em at Yahoo! Sports for a chance to win $1 million for the perfect bracket, and there is a guaranteed $10K prize for the best bracket.

Check out the video for more trends spiking this week.