Antarctica’s transition to an ice world millions of years ago, revealed in study

New study of sea floor core samples sheds light on how mammals and the Antarctic environment evolved in icy conditions. The emergence of mammals such as whales and penguins and the ecosystem that we are familiar with today in the seas off Antarctica can be traced back to when it was transformed into an icy world approximately 33.5 million years ago, according to research published today . An international team, led by Utrecht University including researchers from Imperial College London, discovered that the development of these ice sheets and the associated seasonal sea ice cover in ancient Antarctica possibly triggered the evolution of near-modern ecosystems providing favourable conditions for larger organisms such as whales and penguins to evolve and survive. The team say their study highlights the fact that major climate change events are often accompanied by rapid biological evolution. Dr Tina Van De Flierdt, from the Department of Earth Science and Engineering at the College, was part of this study. In 2010 she travelled to Antarctica on a research ship as part of the Integrated Ocean Drilling Programme (IODP) where they drilled deep into the seafloor for sediment cores along the Antarctic margin south of Australia. Previous studies carried out by the team on these cores revealed that sub tropical plants covered Antarctica approximately 53 million years ago.