|
Pinhead-sized fossils buried deep under the ocean show that glaciers did not
coat the poles 41 million years ago, a new study shows, disputing earlier
research that suggested huge ice sheets covered the Earth's extremities.
Any glaciers then -- a time when the planet was much warmer -- would only have
been in small areas in Antarctica's interior and not in the Northern hemisphere,
said Paul Wilson, from Britain's National Oceanography Centre, who led the
study.
Wilson's study contradicts research published in 2005 that suggested ice sheets
covered much of both polar regions, despite the higher temperatures. He added
that the fossils could provide clues to the future of climate change.
"Essentially their idea (in the earlier study) was a mistake based on inadequate
data," he told Reuters of the previous study before his work appeared in the
journal Nature.
Using the world's only ship capable of ...