Photo of the Week: Life under the Ice

Seen at three different magnifications, diatoms and other phytoplankton were collected off Antarctica by an international team studying the ecology in a region near the Larsen ice shelf where icebergs have recently calved. B. Jack Pan, a graduate student at Scripps Institution of Oceanography at the University of California San Diego and former Scripps student Mattias Cape joined colleagues on the icebreaking research vessel ARAON operated by the Korean Institute for Polar Research to study a range of iceberg-driven processes in the Weddell Sea. The immediate influence of glaciers on plankton ecology and the marine food web is not well understood but by studying icebergs in the aftermath of ice shelf collapse, researchers hope to get a better understanding of the direct impact of climate warming on polar ecosystems and biogeochemistry. Photos: B. Jack Pan