New analyses of ancient ice from Antarctica and the air contained inside it are extending the history of Earth’s climate records and expanding researchers’ understanding of how the planet has changed over the last 3 million years.
New analyses of ancient ice from Antarctica and the air contained inside it are extending the history of Earth’s climate records and expanding researchers’ understanding of how the planet has changed over the last 3 million years.
The findings, published this week in two papers in the journal Nature, show the long-term cooling of Earth’s climate during this period has been accompanied by only a modest decline in heat-trapping greenhouse gases in the atmosphere.
Scientists have known that Earth was much warmer and sea level much higher as recently as 3 million years ago since the first discoveries more than 100 years ago of temperate and subtropical forest fossils in Alaska and Greenland and ancient stranded beaches stretching from Georgia to Virginia.
Read More: Oregon State University
Photo Credit: Allan Hills, Antarctica. (Photo Credit: Julia Marks Peterson)
