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CACHE PEP-P: James Ross Island Ice Cap Drilling - PROJECT

Entry ID: GB-NERC-BAS-AEDC-00303

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Summary

Abstract: A team of eight scientists will visit James Ross Island to recover the first complete ice core climate record from the northern Antarctic Peninsula spanning for the Holocene (which began over 10,000 years ago and continues today) to help shed new light on how ice shelves in the region responded to past climate change. This ice core, together with information from marine sediment cores, will help ... scientists state with certainty whether this current rate of warming is unusual. It will enable the climate record of the Berkner Island ice core to be accurately compared with northern Antarctic Pennisula climates and is an essential link to the current southward limit of the IGBP PAGES PEP1 transect in Patagonia.

Research activities: We expect to measure the following parameters:
- oxygen isotope ratios (temperature proxy) deuterium/hydrogen ratio (moisture source region);
- ice electrical properties (both dielectric, and DC) to identify annual layers for dating;
- ice/melt layer frequency as an index of peak summer temperature;
- dust particles (number and size and as calcium) as markers of continental dust;
- methane sulphonate (MSA) as an indicator of marine biological activity;
- sulphate from sea salt, marine biological activity and large volcanic events;
- sodium chloride from sea salt, as an indication of sea ice production;
- trapped greenhouse gases (CO2 and CH4) for a high-resolution record of forcing, and for synchronisation with other cores.

The high accumulation rate at this site will make identification of seasonal cycles in many species (e.g. nitrate, MSA, sodium, dust) easily identified. We expect to be able to provide a precise chronology by counting these seasonal layers through the full Holocene. Discrete volcanic events will provide a check on the dating accuracy, and cross correlation of dating with the existing Antarctic Peninsula, Berkner and DML ice cores and regional lake and marine sediment cores. We will use salts, temperature and MSA to tie in with records of past sea ice extent, migration of oceanographic fronts and primary production from marine records and primary production, moisture balance and indicators of glacial activity in lake records. This is a project level description with datasets currently being collected. This record will be updated once the data has been collected. As the exact months of the data collection were not provided, and the metadata standard requires a YYYY-MM-D
D format, this dataset has been dated as 1st January.