Genomic data to determine last time when WAIS was ice free

[jim mcnamara]

From Science:

How the West Antarctic Ice Sheet (WAIS) responded to warmer climates in the geologic past has obvious relevance to our understanding of what its future could be as global temperatures rise due to human activities. Using genetic analyses of a type of circum-Antarctic octopus, Pareledone turqueti, Lau et al. showed that the WAIS collapsed completely during the last interglacial period, when global sea levels were 5 to 10 meters higher than today and global average temperatures were only about 1°C warmer

https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.ade0664

 

[Greg Bernhardt]

Here is the popsci release on it
https://phys.org/news/2023-12-octopus-dna-antarctic-ice-sheet.html