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TOPIC: Antarctica


L

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Larsen Ice Shelf
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 Satellite observes rapid ice shelf disintegration in Antarctic

As ESA's Envisat satellite marks ten years in orbit, it continues to observe the rapid retreat of one of Antarctica's ice shelves due to climate warming.
One of the satellite's first observations following its launch on 1 March 2002 was of break-up of a main section of the Larsen B ice shelf in Antarctica - when 3200 sq km of ice disintegrated within a few days due to mechanical instabilities of the ice masses triggered by climate warming.

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Posts: 131433
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McMurdo Dry Valleys
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Antarctic salty soil sucks water out of atmosphere: Could it happen on Mars?

The frigid McMurdo Dry Valleys in Antarctica are a cold, polar desert, yet the sandy soils there are frequently dotted with moist patches in the spring despite a lack of snowmelt and no possibility of rain.
A new study, led by an Oregon State University geologist, has found that that the salty soils in the region actually suck moisture out of the atmosphere, raising the possibility that such a process could take place on Mars or on other planets.
The study, which was supported by the National Science Foundation, has been published online this week in the journal Geophysical Research Letters, and will appear in a forthcoming printed edition.

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RE: Antarctica
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Fabian Gottlieb Thaddeus von Bellingshausen, leader of the first Russian circumnavigation expedition, discovered the continent of Antarctica on January 28, 1820.
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Ever wondered what Antarctica would look like without all that ice?
Scientists have produced the most detailed map yet of the White Continent's underbelly - its rock bed.
Called simply BEDMAP, this startling view of the landscape beneath the ice incorporates decades of survey data acquired by planes, satellites, ships and even people on dog-drawn sleds.

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Drop in carbon dioxide levels led to polar ice sheet

A drop in carbon dioxide appears to be the driving force that led to the Antarctic ice sheet's formation, according to a recent study led by scientists at Yale and Purdue universities of molecules from ancient algae found in deep-sea core samples.
The key role of the greenhouse gas in one of the biggest climate events in Earth's history supports carbon dioxide's importance in past climate change and implicates it as a significant force in present and future climate.
The team pinpointed a threshold for low levels of carbon dioxide below which an ice sheet forms in the South Pole, but how much the greenhouse gas must increase before the ice sheet melts - which is the relevant question for the future - remains a mystery.

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Gamburtsev mountains
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Gamburtsev 'ghost mountains mystery solved'

Scientists say they can now explain the existence of what are perhaps Earth's most extraordinary mountains.
The Gamburtsevs are the size of the European Alps and yet they are totally buried beneath the Antarctic ice.
Their discovery in the 1950s was a major surprise. Most people had assumed the rock bed deep within the continent would be flat and featureless.
Survey data now suggests the range first formed over a billion years ago.

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Posts: 131433
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Gamburtsev Subglacial Mountains
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Antarctica's Gamburtsev Subglacial Mountains Mystery Solved
 
National Science Foundation- (NSF) funded researchers may have at last answered a 50 year-old conundrum. They may now know how Antarctica's Gamburtsev Subglacial Mountains were formed, which has been a question for scientists since their discovery in 1958.
Researchers involved in a highly complex research deployment to the Gamburtsev Subglacial Mountains, a centerpiece of the 2007-2009 International Polar Year (IPY), conclude the mountains formed as a result of multiple tectonic events, rather than a single event.

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RE: Antarctica
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Bristol scientists to solve the "mystery" of Antarctic mass loss

An international team of scientists at the University of Bristol and Newcastle has been awarded £760,000 by the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) to investigate the changing mass of the Antarctic Ice Sheet.
The project, led by Professor Jonathan Bamber in the University's School of Geographical Sciences with Dr Jonty Rougier in the Departments of Maths, will be using a combination of satellite observations, GPS data and climate model output to determine the evolution of the mass of the Antarctic ice sheet over the last two decades.

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NASA Research Yields Full Map of Antarctic Ice Flow

NASA-funded researchers have created the first complete map of the speed and direction of ice flow in Antarctica. The map, which shows glaciers flowing thousands of miles from the continent's deep interior to its coast, will be critical for tracking future sea-level increases from climate change. The team created the map using integrated radar observations from a consortium of international satellites.
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Antarctica rising by 5 millimetres a year

The loss of ice due to climate change in Antarctica is causing the once buoyant continent to be heaven-bound.
Donald Argus of NASA''s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, and colleagues used 15 years of GPS data to show that parts of the Ellsworth mountains in west Antarctica are rising by around 5 mm a year, reports New Scientist.

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