JUNE 24,
2020
by
Research Organization of Information and Systems
Researchers
have been surprised to find that Adélie penguins in Antarctica prefer reduced
sea ice conditions, not just a little bit, but a lot. As climate models project
rapid reduction of the continent's sea ice over the rest of the century, this
iconic polar predator could be a rare global warming winner. Their research
findings are published on June 24, 2020 in Science Advances.
In recent
decades, Antarctica has experienced a steady increase in the extent of its sea
ice—frozen seawater—even as its polar twin, the Arctic, has suffered through a
marked decrease. But this is not expected to last for much longer as the
climate changes, with Antarctica also projected to see a decline in its sea
ice, with all the consequences of such changes to the maritime habitat for the
organisms that live there.
But such
consequences aren't always negative.
Polar
biologists have known for some time that Adélie penguins, the most common
species of penguin in Antarctica, tend to see population increases during years
of sparse sea ice and suffer massive breeding failures during those years with
the greatest growth of sea ice.
But until
now, researchers didn't really know why this happened. The handful of studies
that made mention of the relationship between population growth and sea ice
have only ever established a correlation, not a cause.
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