Latest Antarctica Stories
Alan McStravick for redOrbit.com – Your Universe Online Amazing GRACE. Scientists and researchers have some interesting news out of Antarctica. The rate of global sea level change has been fairly well-established. The understanding for exactly why this is occurring got a new wrinkle this past week. Utilizing the Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment (GRACE) satellite data, a team was able to more accurately calculate the ice sheet mass loss by mapping and removing the mass changes...
April Flowers for redOrbit.com - Your Universe Online A National Science Foundation (NSF) supported research team retrieved data from a sensor in Antarctic waters that they hope will provide critical baseline data for the acidification, or chemical changes, in those remote seas. Led by Gretchen Hofmann – professor of ecology, evolution and marine biology at the University of California, Santa Barbara (UCSB) – the all female team retrieved the sensor earlier this month following the...
NASA's Operation IceBridge got the 2012 Antarctic campaign off to a productive start with a land ice survey of Thwaites Glacier and a sea ice flight over parts of the Bellingshausen Sea. During the first few weeks of a campaign, IceBridge typically concentrates on sea ice before it begins to melt as spring temperatures rise, but as often happens in the field, the weather had other ideas. On Oct. 12, the IceBridge team met with meteorologists at the Punta Arenas airport to discuss...
Brett Smith for redOrbit.com - Your Universe Online As average global temperatures rise, climatologists are scrambling to see how this development might affect polar ice sheet melt, which could potentially result in a dangerous rise in sea levels. In studying the polar ice sheets around Antarctica, a group of British researchers has found that the shape of water channels beneath the ice can have a strong effect on ice behavior, temporarily hiding indications of its retreat. A report...
WASHINGTON, Oct. 12, 2012 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Scientists and flight crew members with Operation IceBridge, NASA's airborne mission to study Earth's changing polar ice, are beginning another campaign over Antarctica. Now in its fourth year, IceBridge's return to the Antarctic comes almost a year after the discovery of a large rift in the continent's Pine Island Glacier. (Logo: http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20081007/38461LOGO) The first science flight of the campaign began...
Scientists and flight crew members with Operation IceBridge, NASA's airborne mission to study Earth's changing polar ice, are beginning another campaign over Antarctica. Now in its fourth year, IceBridge's return to the Antarctic comes almost a year after the discovery of a large rift in the continent's Pine Island Glacier. The first science flight of the campaign began Friday at 8 a.m. EDT when NASA's DC-8 research aircraft left Punta Arenas, Chile, for an 11-hour flight that will take it...
Part of NSF's International Polar Year research portfolio, the six-nation study indicates that shallow-water populations have little in common Differing contributions of freshwater from glaciers and streams to the Arctic and Southern oceans appear to be responsible for the fact that the majority of microbial communities that thrive near the surface at the Poles share few common members, according to an international team of researchers, some of whom were supported by the National Science...
[ Watch the Video: National Ice Core Lab Stores Valuable Ancient Ice ] Lee Rannals for redOrbit.com - Your Universe Online While temperatures across the country start to cool in accordance to the changing of seasons, there is one place in Denver, Colorado where it stays cool all year round. Colorado experienced record highs this summer, but the National Ice Core Laboratory (NICL) was one place in the state that stayed well below hot, at minus 10 degrees Fahrenheit. The...
DALIAN, China, Sept. 24, 2012 /PRNewswire/ -- With the rapid growth of the economy and the progress of society, environmental concern has become an important issue that can not be neglected by the world. In other words, environmental concern has become a major theme of the new century, which has drawn more and more people's attention. With this in mind, however, the Antarctic, always honored as the last pure land on the earth, recently received a "big gift" from the...
Lee Rannals for redOrbit.com – Your Universe Online A new study found that fast-flowing and narrow glaciers could trigger massive changes in the Antarctic ice sheet, inevitably adding sea-level rise and ice-sheet decay. The team tested high-resolution model simulations against reconstructions of the Antarctic ice sheet from 20,000 years ago. Writing in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), they said they used a new model during their study, capable of...
Latest Antarctica Reference Libraries
Antarctica is the Earths southernmost continent; it contains the geographic South Pole. It’s situated in the Antarctic area of the Southern Hemisphere, almost completely south of the Antarctic Circle, and is bordered by the Southern Ocean. It’s the fifth-largest continent at 5.4 million sq miles. On average, it is the driest, coldest, and windiest continent as well as having the highest average elevation of all the continents. Considered a desert, the annual precipitation is only 8...
The Ross seal (Ommatophoca rossii) is a true seal in the Phocidae family, and can only be found on pack ice in Antarctica. This species was formally described by James Clark Ross in 1841, during his British Antarctic Expedition. It is very uncommon to see in its range and rarely leaves the pack ice, with stray individuals occurring off southeast Australia or sub-Antarctic islands. The Ross seal can reach an average length between 5.5 and 6.9 feet, although some females can reach up to 8.2...
The Weddell seal (Leptonychotes weddellii) is a large true seal in the Lobodontini tribe. It is native to Antarctica, with its range consisting of a large “ring” that surrounds Antarctica. This seal will spend most of its time in the water instead of on land. The Weddell seal appears on the IUCN Red List with a conservation status of “Least Concern”. It is estimated this seal numbers over 800,000 individuals in the wild. First discovered in 1820s by a British sealing captain...
The Antarctic Silverfish, (Pleuragramma antarcticum), is a member of the Notothenioidei family of fish. It is widely distributed around the Antarctic, but has largely disappeared from the western side of the northern Antarctic Peninsula based on 2010 research funded by the National Science Foundation. It is also found throughout the Southern Ocean. It grows to an average size of 6 inches, but has been known to reach lengths of up to 10 inches. It is usually pink with a silver tint, and...
Cryolophosaurus, meaning "cold crest lizard", is a genus of theropod dinosaur from the Early Jurassic Period (Pliensbachian Age). It is known from the Hanson Formation (previously known as the Upper Falla Formation). It was discovered by paleontologist Dr. William Hammer in 1991. It was the first carnivorous dinosaur to be discovered in Antarctica. It was also the first dinosaur from Antarctica to be officially named. Dr. William Hammer and his team unearthed the dinosaur during the...
