Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
With the help of existing ice core data, scientists have been able to ruminate about 'ice ages'
occurring every 100,000 years or so. Before then, 'ice age' frequency was around
40,000$si
Thus, the extraction of ice cores has revolutionized scientific debates on climate
change, because the analysis of trapped atmospheric bubbles contributes to better
understanding why the Earth's climate has shifted. These trapped bubbles help reveal what
greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide were like hundreds of thousands of years ago. Ice
core research has already confirmed that we are currently experiencing a comparatively
mild interglacial phase within a series of warm/cold oscillations. Scientists are eager to
better understand what causes these natural climatic cycles, so that we understand what
caused the length of these cycles to alter by some 60,000 years, and possibly relate this shift
to a lowering of atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations.
Led by the Australian Antarctic Division, the MY+ project will extract a complete ice core
from an area of the Antarctic in which the ice is thickest. Within the Australian Antarctic
Territory, the Aurora Basin close to the Australian scientific station of Casey was identified
as suitable because ice cover is over 2 miles in depth with a low snow accumulation rate and
low ice velocity. The project itself, launched as part of a contribution to the IPY, will take
something like five summer seasons of drilling and another three to four years of ice core
analysis. Such a deep ice core, with embedded evidence of past gaseous concentrations, will
be essential in order to reconstruct climate history some one million plus years ago and
complements research on sub-glacial lakes with a focus on the pre-glacial history of the
Antarctic. For a claimant state such as Australia, support for the project from the 18 other
members of the International Partnerships in Ice Core Sciences group is important, and
unquestionably useful in cementing Australian leadership in Antarctic science, and it is
worth remembering that there has been much media and policy-related debate in the country
about the need to maintain investment in science and infrastructure in the massive
Australian Antarctic Territory. This project reminds us again that science and geopolitics
work closely with one another even if they appear to be separate.
3. Census of Antarctic Marine Life (CAML)
Following the 2007-9 International Polar Year, a Census of Antarctic Marine Life (CAML)
revealed that over 235 marine organisms are found in both the Arctic Ocean and Southern
Ocean. Larger creatures such as whales and birds undertake this bi-polar migration on an
annual basis, and smaller creatures such as sea cucumbers and snails are common to both
polar oceans. Marine currents and fairly uniform temperatures in the deep ocean are
believed to be the key drivers of this extraordinary movement of species. For the Antarctic
