Returning from the confines of Antarctica, an international team of scientists including a researcher from the University of Manitoba has succeeded in extracting the longest continuous sample of ice in the world. This advance should provide a better understanding of the history of Earth’s climate patterns over 1.2 million years.
Scientists hope the research project that drilled down to bedrock beneath the Antarctic ice sheet will shed light on the planet’s atmospheric history thanks to air bubbles trapped in the Antarctic ice core. 2800 meters, indicates the University of Manitoba, in a press release Thursday.
It’s a huge victory
said Dorthe Dahl-Jensen, Canada Excellence Research Chair in Arctic sea ice, seawater-freshwater coupling and climate change at the University of Manitoba.
It’s absolutely incredible. It’s a dream.
Ms. Dahl-Jensen is also affiliated with a team based in Denmark that participated in the ice coring project.
This research project required the collaboration of scientific and logistical teams from the four corners of Europe. It was funded by the European Commission, with support from national partners from Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Italy, Norway, Sweden, Switzerland, the Netherlands and the United Kingdom .
Dorthe Dahl-Jensen explains that the extraction of the ice core is the result of an extensive mapping effort to identify a site containing very old ice using radar.
This is atmospheric air trapped at this time. So imagine that you are holding 1.5 million year old air in your hand
she illustrates. We can measure the greenhouse gases present at that time.
Although scientists in other parts of the world have found much older ice, this ice core is believed to contain the longest continuous climate sequence ever extracted, according to the University of Manitoba (New window) (in English).
John Higgins, member of an American research center on the ancient ice of the U.S. National Science Foundationknown by the acronym COLDEXmaintains that this carrot is very interesting for climatologists around the world
.
[Les carottes de glace] are the closest thing to a time machine that can measure the state of the atmosphere in the past
he explains.
Mr. Higgins was involved in another exploration project that extracted ice about six million years old in another area of Antarctica.
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Ice cores “are the closest thing to a time machine for measuring the state of the atmosphere in the past,” says COLDEX member John Higgins.
Photo: Submitted by Ian Van Coller
Although these discoveries go back further in time, Higgins maintains that continued sampling is sort of an entire book that goes back 1.2 million years
while the discoveries of the COLDEX are more similar to pages or chapters from a much older book
.
We usually find much older pieces of ice, but our books are incomplete, this is only part of a book
he summarizes.
Dahl-Jensen says groups from other countries, including Australia, the United States and Japan, have done similar work to her team, but her team managed to get ahead in this race.
We are far ahead of everyone else. And of course it’s really great
she congratulates herself.
Earth’s past to understand its future
The ice core collected by Dahl-Jensen and her colleagues was removed in pieces before being shipped for research purposes, and may be reassembled later in sequence.
It’s like a measuring tape
says the researcher.
This information from the past could help scientists better understand what is happening with the planet’s climate now, and what might happen in the future.
In many ways, we travel to an ancient world to find connections to what is happening today
she summarizes.
