SciencePoles news
Recent Polar Science and Climate Change news are featured here. Our news RSS feed will inform you when news are published on this website.
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New Study Shows Fires Spread Environmental Toxins in the Arctic
02.06.2010
According to new research conducted under the FLEXPOP project, forest fires and straw and stubble burning in North America and Eastern Europe are producing concentrations of polychlorinated biphenyl (PCB) in the Arctic. The study is the first to show a connection between burning of biomass and PCB concentrations in the…
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Examining Carbon ‘Burps’ that Helped End the Last Ice Age
31.05.2010
The results of a recent study, published in the journal Science, suggest that carbon dioxide (CO2) was probably efficiently locked away in the deep ocean during the last ice age. Working on a marine sediment core recovered from the Southern Ocean seabed, the researchers radiocarbon-dated shells left behind by foraminifera…
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Large Mammals Had an Impact on the Global Climate
27.05.2010
More than 13,000 years ago, millions of large mammals such as mammoths, mastodon, shrub-ox, bison, ground sloths and camels roamed the Americas and may have had profound influences on the environment according to research released in the publication Nature Geosciences Sunday.
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Survey to Collect Sea Water beneath Arcic Sea Ice Completed
18.05.2010
British explorers Ann Daniels, Charlie Paton and Martin Hartley from the Catlin Arctic Survey reached the Geographic North Pole at on 12th May after a 60-day trek across the Arctic Ocean’s sea ice. During their challenging trek they collected water and marine life samples from underneath the sea ice as…
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2009 Warmest Year on Record at the South Pole
12.05.2010
While the average temperature at the South Pole in 2009 was a frosty -47.9°C, according to meteorologists at Amundsen-Scott Station, 2009 was the warmest year on record at the South Pole since temperature records began to be taken in 1957. The last record high average temperature was recorded in 2002,…
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Stream Water Analysis Helps in Assessment of Permafrost Thaw
07.05.2010
Monitoring changes in permafrost is difficult using current methods. Fortunately, researchers from the University of Michigan have developed a new approach based on the use of chemical tracers in stream water.
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25th Anniversary of Ozone Hole Discovery
07.05.2010
The British Antarctic Survey (BAS) has commemorated the 25th anniversary of its discovery of the ozone hole over Antarctica. This includes a reflection from one of the original scientsits to have discovered it.
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Antarctic Micrometeorites Provide New Clues to Origins of Organic Molecules on Earth
07.05.2010
In a new analysis published in the journal Science, a French team working at Concordia Station in Antarctica has announced that it has found some well-preserved meteorite samples beneath the surface of the ice sheet. These include so-called micrometeorites — fragments of meteorites about a millimetre across that may contain…
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“Snowball Earth” Caused Major Changes in Past Carbon Cycle
05.05.2010
A new study recently published in the journal Science suggests that an episode known as “snowball earth”, which occurred some 720 million years ago, may have produced a dramatic change in the carbon cycle. This change could have in turn triggered future ice ages.
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Wilkes Land Sediment Cores Help Scientists Understand Past Dramatic Antarctic Climate Change
30.04.2010
A recent research expedition in Antarctic waters could yield critical clues to understand how some 53 million years ago Antarctica switched from a warm, sub-tropical environment to its current icy state. In a mere 400,000 years, concentrations of atmospheric carbon dioxide on the continent decreased as global temperatures dropped and…
