Over the past 40 years, ice cores have revealed more about climate change than any other scientific technique. Over the last few decades, satellites have detected changes to the amount of sea ice that covers the polar oceans. Since 1979 summer sea-ice extent in the Arctic has reduced at 10% per decade. Some major glaciers that drain the Antarctic and Greenland ice sheets have accelerated by as much as 50%.

AGAP

Exploring Antarctica’s ‘ghost mountains’

ANiSEED

This project will reconstruct millennial-scale ice sheet change in the western Amundsen Sea Embayment, Antarctica, using high-precision exposure dating.

A snow covered mountain.

Filchner Ice Shelf System, Antarctica

Understanding the contribution that polar ice sheets make to global sea-level rise is recognised internationally as urgent.  The mission of this five-year project is to capture new observations and data …

NEWS STORY: Ice melt rates measured

13 September, 2013

Antarctic research details ice melt below massive glacier An expedition of international scientists to the far reaches of Antarctica’s remote Pine Island Glacier has yielded exact measurements of an undersea …

A fighter jet sitting on top of a runway.

NEWS STORY: Mission to Pine Island Glacier

9 September, 2013

Ambitious science mission sets off for Antarctica A team of British scientists is making final preparations for an ambitious Antarctic science mission. They aim to discover what’s causing the recent …

NEWS STORY: Measuring icequakes

28 August, 2013

Icequakes unlock secrets of icestreams Measuring tiny icequakes is helping British Antarctic Survey scientists investigate ice streams despite the challenging environment they have to work in. The work of Emma …

Field experiment investigating production of NO and NO2 from a block of Antarctic snow by comparing mixing ratios in i) ambient air, ii) snowblock interstitial air when exposed to sunlight, and iii) snowblock interstitial air when shaded. Data are averages of 1 minute measurements for each time period shown. (Jones, A.E., Weller, R., Wolff, E.W., Jacobi, H-W., Speciation and Rate of Photochemical NO and NO2 Production in Antarctic Snow, Geophys. Res. Lett., 27, 3, 345-348, 2000. Copyright 2000 American Geophysical Union. Reproduced/modified by permission of American Geophysical Union.)

NEWS STORY: Royal Society accolade for expert

20 March, 2013

Top scientist receives Royal Society Research Professorship to fund long-term UK research A Royal Society Research Professorship has been awarded to one of British Antarctic Survey’s leading climate scientists Professor …

NEWS STORY: Greenland ice shows past trends

23 January, 2013

Greenland ice core reveals warm past temperatures British Antarctic Survey scientists have contributed to a new study published in Nature (Thursday 24 January) that provides surprising details on changes in …

Tabular iceberg in the Weddell Sea

NEWS STORY: Sea level rise calculated

30 November, 2012

British Antarctic Survey researchers part of landmark study to improve projections for future sea level An international team of satellite experts including researchers at British Antarctic Survey has produced the …

A close up of a snow covered mountain.

PRESS RELEASE: Ice sheet behaviour analysed

17 October, 2012

Ice sheet retreat controlled by the landscape Ice-sheet retreat can halt temporarily during long phases of climate warming, according to scientists. A UK team led by Durham University has found …

The break up of Wilkins Ice Shelf

NEWS STORY: Assessing potential sea level rise

10 May, 2012

New studies improve scientists’ understanding of the potential contribution of the Antarctic Ice Sheet to global sea level rise Three peer-reviewed papers in Nature and Nature Geoscience published in recent …