Antarctica news, features and articles

The fledglings are typically reared on floating platforms of sea ice, but an unprecedented decline in the ice extent has driven young onto cliffs.

In 1898, the crew of the first scientific expedition to Antarctica became trapped inside sea ice around the southernmost continent. Much of that once thick ice is dwindling, says polar researcher Edward Doddridge.

Sea ice extent in Antarctica is vital for keeping ice on the continent and sea levels low. But its dwindling extent could mean the continent has shifted to a new regime, with global ramifications.

A research expedition in the Southern Ocean has mapped a string of seamounts that help to shape the Antarctic Circumpolar Current — an ocean current that flows clockwise around Antarctica.

The gigantic iceberg A23a, which broke off from Antarctica in 1986, is finally moving away from the icy continent after being stuck on the seafloor for decades.

British Antarctic Survey researchers have found that the rate at which ice is melting and contributing to sea level rise will accelerate in the next century, regardless of actions to limit greenhouse gas emissions.

Satellite data have revealed an ancient landscape that may have escaped erosion and been preserved beneath the East Antarctic ice sheet since the continent froze over 34 million years ago.

Hefty iceberg D-30A has collided with Clarence Island — an important refuge for breeding penguins in Antarctica. But luckily, the penguins weren't at home when the berg struck.

Scientists in Antarctica did the unimaginable: They grew a bounty of watermelons while living on the ice-cold continent.

The extent of sea ice in Antarctica has shrunk compared with the long-term average for this time of year between 1981 and 2010 by an area four times the size of Texas.