Recommendations of the National Academies' Study: A Strategic Vision for NSF Investments in Antarctic and Southern Ocean Research

Laurie Geller, National Academy of Sciences, Polar Research Board, Washington, DC, United States, Robert A Weller, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, Woods Hole, MA, United States and Oscar Schofield, Rutgers University, Department of Marine and Coastal Sciences, New Brunswick, NJ, United States
Abstract:
A new study from the National Academy of Sciences, involving input from over 450 scientists around the country, has proposed a strategic vision and priorities for NSF’s investments in Antarctic and Southern Ocean research for the coming decade. The Committee recommended that NSF continue to invest in a broad portfolio of research, balanced with a few larger-scale, more directed efforts, including the following priority initiatives:
  1. How fast and how far will sea level rise? The Changing Antarctic Ice Sheets Initiative
  2. How do Antarctic biota evolve and adapt to the changing environment? Decoding the genomic and transcriptomic bases of biological adapta­tion and response across Antarctic organisms and ecosystems
  3. How did our Universe begin and what are the underlying physical laws that govern its evolu­tion and ultimate fate? A next generation cosmic microwave background program.

Here we will focus on the proposed “Changing Ice Sheets Initiative”, which includes following main elements:

  • A multidisciplinary campaign to understand why the Antarctic ice sheets are changing now and how they will change in the future. Advancing understanding of the complex interactions among ice, ocean, atmosphere, and climate that drive Antarctic ice sheet changes will require a coordinated campaign of focused process studies, sustained observations, and mapping of unknown terrains in critical regions of the ocean, ice surface, and sub-ice environment, along with advancement of the coupled models.
  • Using multiple records of past ice sheet change to under­stand rates and processes. Integrated studies of ice cores from the last interglacial period that can provide annual-scale resolution, together with marine sediment cores from key areas, may yield new insights on how fast ice sheets have collapsed in the past.

We will discuss how this proposed initiative can build upon West Antarctic Ice Sheet research to date, and what types of infrastructure and logistical support are most critical for enabling the proposed research.

Back to: High Latitude Air-Sea-Ice Interactions  in a Changing Climate II Posters