Study Reveals a Massive Ice Cap Covered Sub-Antarctic Island of South Georgia
South Georgia is an island that reveals an astonishing beauty of its famous wildlife and impressive landscapes that were covered by a massive ice. The sub-antarctic island that home of various species of penguins and seals is also has been featured on documentaries including Frozen Planet and the Planet Earth II.
According to Phys Org, the research team from the University of Exeter discovered something at the peak of the ice age which has some impressive ice fields that extended tens of kilometers from the island. The researchers also found out that the ice has been sensitive to cooling and warming as the climate changes.
This result is currently reported in the newest edition of the journal Nature Communications, as the researchers from the UK, Germany, and Australia investigated the seafloor where the survival of ocean ecosystems is connected to heavily patterns of glaciations. It is interesting to know the sea-bed creatures lived throughout the ice age.
BBC reported that the researchers from Exeter University were able to find the tracer of the ice cap and it raised on the outer part of the margin of the continental shelf that is bigger than all the others. The researchers also found that there are hundreds of distinct ridges that bulldozed into the seabed by glaciers.
The South Georgia's glaciers are possibly unsurprising as it were sensitive to climate change, yet it really shows that the glaciers were dynamic and underwent big changes over geological time. The researchers conducted sonar surveys around the South Georgia by using a research vessel the British Antarctic Surveys.
The co-author from British Antarctic Survey said that studying the history of glacial changes in a longer-term is a key to understandings the sensitivity of glaciers to climate change, and the impacts on its biodiversity and the species survival. As the global climate warmed, the glaciers retreating so fast and pulling back the positions that are not far beyond the current coastline.
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