SCIENCE IN THE NEWS DAILY
Why Antarctic Sea Ice Is Growing in a Warmer World
from National Geographic News
Climate scientists have cracked the mystery of why Antarctic sea ice has managed to grow despite global warming--but the results suggest the trend may rapidly reverse, a new study says.
Satellite data show that, over the past 30 years, Arctic sea ice has declined while Antarctic sea ice has mysteriously expanded, according to study leader Jiping Liu, a research scientist at Georgia Tech in Atlanta. "We've seen this paradox, but we don't know why--here we gave an explanation," Liu said.
The new analyses are based on climate models and sea-surface temperature and precipitation observations from 1950 to 2009. They show that, in the 20th century, ocean warming boosted precipitation in the upper atmosphere over the Antarctic region, which fell as snow.
Read more...
Science in the Media
Newspapers:
Magazines and Web Sites:
The Science-Media Intersection:
Subscribe to Our Content!
Visit our RSS Feeds page to choose among 13 customized feeds, or create a free My AmSci account to request an email notice whenever a specified author, department or discipline appears online.