Antarctic sea ice extent reached a new record low of 1.965 million km2 on 23 February 2022. This extent is approximately 32% below climatological values and might indicate a transition to new, more extreme, annual fluctuations.
This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution
Relevant articles
Open Access articles citing this article.
-
Projected Antarctic sea ice change contributes to increased occurrence of strong El Niño
npj Climate and Atmospheric Science Open Access 03 October 2024
-
Synergistic atmosphere-ocean-ice influences have driven the 2023 all-time Antarctic sea-ice record low
Communications Earth & Environment Open Access 03 August 2024
-
Projections of winter polynyas and their biophysical impacts in the Ross Sea Antarctica
Climate Dynamics Open Access 23 September 2023
Access options
Access Nature and 54 other Nature Portfolio journals
Get Nature+, our best-value online-access subscription
$29.99 / 30 days
cancel any time
Subscribe to this journal
Receive 12 digital issues and online access to articles
$119.00 per year
only $9.92 per issue
Buy this article
- Purchase on SpringerLink
- Instant access to full article PDF
Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout
References
Stammerjohn, S., Massom, R., Rind, D. & Martinson, D. Regions of rapid sea ice change: An inter-hemispheric seasonal comparison. Geophys. Res. Lett. 39, L06501 (2012).
Cheng, L. et al. Another record: Ocean warming continues through 2021 despite La Niña conditions. Adv. Atmos. Sci. 39, 373–385 (2022).
Abram, N. et al. Summary for Policymakers. In IPCC Special Report on the Ocean and Cryosphere in a Changing Climate (eds H.-O. Pörtner et al.)(IPCC, 2019).
Fogt, R. L., Sleinkofer, A. M., Raphael, M. N. & Handcock, M. S. A regime shift in seasonal total Antarctic sea ice extent in the twentieth century. Nat. Clim. Chang. 12, 54–62 (2022).
Handcock, M. S. & Raphael, M. N. Modeling the annual cycle of daily Antarctic sea ice extent. The Cryosphere 14, 2159–2172 (2020).
Li, X. et al. Tropical teleconnection impacts on Antarctic climate changes. Nat. Rev. Earth Environ. 2, 680–698 (2021).
Jenouvrier, S. et al. The call of the emperor penguin: Legal responses to species threatened by climate change. Glob. Chang. Biol. 27, 5008–5029 (2021).
Meier, W. N., Fetterer, F., Windnagel, A. K. & Stewart, J. S. NOAA/NSIDC Climate Data Record of Passive Microwave Sea Ice Concentration Version 4 (NSIDC, accessed 28 February 2022); https://doi.org/10.7265/efmz-2t65.
Meier, W. N., Fetterer, F., Windnagel, A. K. & Stewart, J. S. NOAA/NSIDC Climate Data Record of Passive Microwave Sea Ice Concentration Version 2 (NSIDC, accessed 28 February 2022); https://doi.org/10.7265/tgam-yv28.
Acknowledgements
M.N.R. and M.S.H. are supported by the National Science Foundation, Office of Polar Programs (grant no. NSF-OPP-1745089).
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Ethics declarations
Competing interests
The authors declare no competing interests.
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Raphael, M.N., Handcock, M.S. A new record minimum for Antarctic sea ice. Nat Rev Earth Environ 3, 215–216 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1038/s43017-022-00281-0
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s43017-022-00281-0
This article is cited by
-
Synergistic atmosphere-ocean-ice influences have driven the 2023 all-time Antarctic sea-ice record low
Communications Earth & Environment (2024)
-
Projected Antarctic sea ice change contributes to increased occurrence of strong El Niño
npj Climate and Atmospheric Science (2024)
-
Antarctic benthic ecological change
Nature Reviews Earth & Environment (2024)
-
Sea ice in 2023
Nature Reviews Earth & Environment (2024)
-
Projections of winter polynyas and their biophysical impacts in the Ross Sea Antarctica
Climate Dynamics (2024)