ANDRILL research indicates remarkably warm period in Antarctica
15.7 million years ago Released on 10/01/2009, at 12:25 PM
Office of University Communications University of
Nebraska–Lincoln BATON ROUGE, La., USA, Oct. 1, 2009 --
Researchers with the Antarctic Geological Drilling Program
(ANDRILL) found unexpected evidence of a remarkably warm period
in Antarctica 15.7 million years ago. The evidence includes
fossils of marine algae and pollen of woody plants indicating
that land temperatures reached a January (austral summer)
average of 10 degrees Celsius (50 degrees Fahrenheit) while
estimated sea surface temperatures ranged between zero and 11.5
degrees Celsius (32 to 53 degrees Fahrenheit). The algae and
pollen were found in sedimentary rock cores drilled in the
austral spring of 2007 from beneath the sea floor of
Antarctica's McMurdo Sound during ANDRILL's Southern McMurdo
Sound Project. Sophie Warny of Louisiana State University, USA,
found the first indication of the warm period while studying
samples f