Researchers from the University of New South Wales and the Australian Antarctic Division have found that slight changes in sea ice’s annual loss timings could negatively impact ecosystems. This is because as ice melts it allows more sunlight to reach the sea floor.
Published in the Global Change Biology journal, the research predicts that polar seabed biodiversity could be reduced by as much as one third in some places within decades.
An ecosystem shift could lead to invertebrate specimens unique to the Antarctic being replaced by algal beds.
Read more at UNSW Sydney