EcoLocalizer

Researchers in have discovered ancient, extremophile life forms that survive with neither light nor oxygen underground in Antarctica.

From the surface, the McMurdo Dry Valleys of Eastern Antarctica appears to be one of the most desolate places on Earth. And indeed it is. Apart from a few glaciers, the land is ice-free. No animals live here, and what few plants are able to are simple planktonic forms. But recently, a team of researchers have discovered evidence of a thriving community of extremophile microbes thriving several hundred feet below the barren surface.

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This month, as the results of data analyses come in, climate scientists are getting a more detailed, far clearer picture of the ‘State of the Poles’ and the effects of warming and climate change in these most extreme regions of our planet. Although this project is actually the culmination of two years work (encompassing 160 separate studies and costing 1.2 billion dollars) it has been officially deemed the ‘International Polar Year’ (IPY).

One of the most important findings of this project is a confirmation of what many climate scientists have suspected for a couple of years now–that the impact of climate change on our environment is happening at a much faster rate than previous computer models predicted. This is true even for the four major reports released by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (the last of which was released in 2007).

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A new study from the journal Nature Geoscience has found that 50% of the total temperature increases in the Arctic over the last century have been due to black carbon, a substance that only stays in the atmosphere for several days to weeks.

This means that if black carbon emissions were immediately halted, it may only take a few weeks for warming trends to reverse by half.

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The Wilkins Ice Shelf has been cracking in new places recently and images released by the European Space Agency show that it will probably very soon break off entirely. A 62 square mile piece broke off in May 2008.

Angelika Humbert of Muenster University stated, “During the last year the ice shelf has lost about 1800 square kilometers (694 square miles), or about 14 percent of its size.” The Wilkins Ice Shelf is currently about the size of Jamaica, though it has already been diminished by about 30 percent.

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A team of international researchers has released the results of an extensive survey of the Antarctic and Arctic oceans.

The census showed 7,500 species in the Antarctic and 5,500 in the Arctic. The total number includes several hundred thought to be newly discovered species. In addition it was discovered, astonishingly, that 200 or more of species are common to both oceans – though they live 11,000 kilometers from one another.

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According to research based upon sea ice models from the IPCC report, Antarctica’s iconic Emperor Penguins could face extinction by the end of the century due to habitat loss.

By comparing observations spanning 43 years of population dynamics against models which project the declining levels of Antarctic sea ice, the study predicts that the giant penguins will be too slow to adapt to changes wrought by global warming.

The startling prediction is being called a conservative estimate by researchers, who claim that the data has as much as a four-in-five chance of being accurate. This number is particularly high because individual Emperor Penguins are long-lived and, as a result, biologically slow learners. Thus, they are unlikely to shift their breeding patterns fast enough to match the rapidly changing climate.

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A report published today in the journal Science helps to reveal more about the possible effects of climate change on global sea level. According to the 2007 4th Assessment Report issued by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change ice shelf breakup is a major contributor to global sea level rise:

“Taken together, the ice sheets in Greenland and
Antarctica have very likely been contributing to sea
level rise over 1993 to 2003.”  IPCC 4th Assessment Report

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Glaciers are melting. It’s a fact. In terms of global warming, the guilt rests with us. We already saw how many of Switzerland’s glaciers are disappearing. Unfortunately, they are not alone.

Pedro Skvarca, glaciologist from Argentina in Antarctica, witnessed the progressive retreating of glaciers from the White Continent in the last ten years. Read the rest of this entry »

Pictures from Torsten Blackwood published by the UK’s Guardian newspaper today graphically reveal just how quickly and how much climate change is affecting the Antarctic. Well worth a look.