Location via proxy:   [ UP ]  
[Report a bug]   [Manage cookies]                
Skip to main content

Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles and JavaScript.

  • NEWS AND VIEWS

Two decades of deep ice cores from Antarctica

In June 2004, the results of an ambitious Antarctic ice-drilling project brought insight into hundreds of thousands of years of climatic changes. The extraordinary sample still has much to offer climate research — even as its successor is being drilled.
  1. Kenji Kawamura

    1. Kenji Kawamura is in the National Institute of Polar Research, Research Organization of Information and Systems, Tokyo 190-8518, Japan.

    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed  Google Scholar

  2. Ikumi Oyabu

    1. Ikumi Oyabu is in the National Institute of Polar Research, Research Organization of Information and Systems, Tokyo 190-8518, Japan.

    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed  Google Scholar

Twenty years ago this month, a large group of researchers reported the first results from the European Project for Ice Coring in Antarctica (EPICA). This was an ambitious bid to archive information about Earth’s past climate by sampling layers of Antarctic ice that had built up over hundreds of thousands of years1. The initial drilling procured ice that was up to 740,000 years old — the oldest ice ever extracted from Antarctica and twice as old as that in earlier records2,3. The core revealed the atmospheric temperature and dust content over Antarctica during the past eight glacial–interglacial cycles, as well as changes in carbon dioxide and methane that accompanied the melting of continental ice sheets in the Northern Hemisphere about 430,000 years ago. The study (and those inspired by it) provoked a discussion about the fundamental drivers and interactions of climatic changes, and about how the past can inform our understanding of current and potential changes.

Access options

Rent or buy this article

Prices vary by article type

from$1.95

to$39.95

Learn more

Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout

Nature 630, 825-827 (2024)

doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-024-01507-5

References

  1. EPICA community members. Nature 429, 623–628 (2004).

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  2. Petit, J. R. et al. Nature 399, 429–436 (1999).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  3. Watanabe, O. et al. Nature 422, 509–512 (2003).

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  4. Blunier, T. & Brook E. J. Science 291, 109–112 (2001).

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  5. Berger, W. H. & Wefer, G. in On the Dynamics of The Ice Ages: Stage-11 Paradox, Mid-Brunhes Climate Shift, and 100-Ky Cycle (eds Droxler, A. W., Poore, R. Z. & Burckle, L. H.) Vol. 137 (Wiley, 2003).

    Google Scholar 

  6. Dome Fuji Ice Core Project Members. Sci. Adv. 3, e1600446 (2017).

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  7. Lüthi, D. et al. Nature 453, 379–382 (2008).

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  8. Kobayashi, H., Oka, A., Yamamoto, A. & Abe-Ouchi, A. Sci. Adv. 7, eabg7723 (2021).

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  9. Abe-Ouchi, A. et al. Nature 500, 190–193 (2013).

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  10. Loulergue, L. et al. Nature 453, 383–386 (2008).

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  11. Ganopolski, A. et al. Clim. Past 7, 1415–1425 (2011).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  12. Hobart, B., Lisiecki, L. E., Rand, D., Lee, T., & Lawrence, C. E. Nature Geosci. 16, 717–722 (2023).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  13. Oyabu, I. et al. Quat. Sci. Rev. 294, 107754 (2022).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  14. Buizert, C. et al. Science 372, 1097–1101 (2021).

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  15. EPICA community members. Nature 444, 195–198 (2006).

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  16. Buizert, C. et al. Nature 563, 681–685 (2018).

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  17. Bereiter, B. et al. Nature 553, 39–44 (2018).

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  18. Goto-Azuma, K. et al. Nature Commun. 10, 3247 (2019).

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  19. Clark, P. U. et al. Quat. Sci. Rev. 25, 3150–3184 (2006).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  20. Lilien, D. A. et al. Cryosphere 15, 1881–1888 (2021).

    Article  Google Scholar 

Download references

Competing Interests

The authors declare no competing interests.

Subjects

Latest on:

Nature Careers

Jobs

Nature Briefing

Sign up for the Nature Briefing newsletter — what matters in science, free to your inbox daily.

Get the most important science stories of the day, free in your inbox. Sign up for Nature Briefing

Search

Advanced search

Quick links