BiotechMashup

(The Earth Institute at Columbia University) A new study in Nature finds that in addition to Antarctica, New Zealand was warming at the end of the last ice age, indicating that the deep freeze up north, called the Younger Dryas for the white flower that grows near glaciers, bypassed much of the southern hemisphere.

The main cause of a rapid global cooling period, known as the Big Freeze or Younger Dryas -- which occurred nearly 13,000 years ago -- has been identified. A new study, has identified a mega-flood path across North America which channeled melt-water from a giant ice sheet into the oceans and triggering the Younger Dryas cold snap.

Early in the 20th century, a succession of adventurers and scientists pioneered the exploration of Antarctica. A century later, they're still at it, albeit with a different set of tools. This fall, a team of modern explorers will fly over Earth's southern ice-covered regions to study changes to its sea ice, ice sheets, and glaciers as part of NASA's Operation Ice Bridge.

New research puts to rest the mystery of where old carbon was stored during the last glacial period. It turns out it ended up in the icy waters of the Southern Ocean near Antarctica.

Scientists report that the rocks on which much of a theory on how the "Snowball Earth" ice age ended was based were formed millions of years after the ice age ended, and were formed at temperatures so high there could have been no living creatures associated with them.

Data from end of the last Ice Age confirm effects of climate change on oceans The first comprehensive study of changes in the oxygenation of oceans at the end of the last Ice Age (between about 10 to 20,000 years ago) has implications for the future of our oceans under global warming.

(California Institute of Technology) A team of scientists led by researchers from Caltech report in this week's issue of the journal Nature that the rocks on which much of a theory on how the "Snowball Earth" ice age ended was based were formed millions of years after the ice age ended, and were formed at temperatures so high there could have been no living creatures associated with them.

(University of Florida) New University of Florida research puts to rest the mystery of where old carbon was stored during the last glacial period. It turns out it ended up in the icy waters of the Southern Ocean near Antarctica.

Biodiversity decreases towards the poles almost everywhere in the world, except along the South American Pacific coast. Investigating fossil clams and snails researchers show that this unusual pattern originated at the end of the last ice age, 20.000 to 100.000 years ago. The retreating glaciers created a mosaic landscape of countless islands, bays and fiords in which new species developed rapidly – geologically speaking. The ancestors of the species survived the ice age in the warmer Chilean north.