Ancient Ice being used in ground-breaking climate research
One of the world’s most ambitious climate research projects is taking place in Cambridge
A shipment of ancient ice cores, drilled from deep beneath Antarctica’s surface, has arrived at the British Antarctic Survey (BAS) headquarters in Cambridge, marking a major milestone for one of the world’s most ambitious climate research projects.
The delivery is part of the Beyond EPICA – Oldest Ice project, an international scientific collaboration aiming to reconstruct up to 1.5 million years of Earth’s climate history—almost twice the current ice core record of 800,000 years.
The cylindrical ice cores, retrieved from depths of up to 2,800 metres at Little Dome C in East Antarctica, were extracted during the project’s fourth drilling campaign. Over the next several years, teams across Europe, including BAS, will analyse the samples in extraordinary detail to unlock critical data about Earth’s ancient climate systems and greenhouse gas levels.
At the heart of the project lies a fundamental scientific mystery: Why did Earth’s glacial cycles shift roughly one million years ago from a 41,000-year to a 100,000-year rhythm?*
Dr Liz Thomas, Head of the Ice Cores team at BAS, explained: “It’s incredibly exciting to be part of this international effort to unlock the deepest secrets of Antarctica’s ice. By extending the ice core record beyond this turning point, researchers hope to improve predictions of how Earth’s climate may respond to future greenhouse gas increases.”
She added: “There is no other place on Earth that retains such a long record of the past atmosphere as Antarctica. It’s our best hope to understand the fundamental drivers of Earth’s climate shifts.”
Until now, researchers studying ancient climates have relied heavily on marine sediment cores, which help define the timing of past glacial-interglacial cycles. But ice cores offer a unique advantage as they preserve direct atmospheric samples, enabling researchers to reconstruct climate conditions with far greater precision.
As the ice cores begin their journey through Europe’s most advanced climate science laboratories, the data they yield may prove transformative—not just for understanding the past, but for shaping our response to the future of Earth’s climate.