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Exploring the 7th Continent (360° VR Channel)
Travel Destinations in Antarctica (BBC News)
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Pages
Polar Regions Arctic, Antarctica
Resources
These are organized by a classification scheme developed exclusively for Cosma. More…
General
Portal
Antarctica (Infoplease), Antarctica Portal (Wikipedia), Antarctica (DMOZ Tools)
Dictionary
Antarctica : continent around the South Pole; a plateau covered by a great ice cap and mountain peaks area about 5,500,000 square miles (14,300,000 square kilometers) — Webster
OneLook, Free Dictionary, Wiktionary, Urban Dictionary
Thesaurus
Roget’s II (Thesaurus.com), Merriam-Webster Thesaurus, Visuwords
Encyclopedia
Antarctica is Earth’s southernmost continent. It contains the geographic South Pole and is situated in the Antarctic region of the Southern Hemisphere, almost entirely south of the Antarctic Circle, and is surrounded by the Southern Ocean. At 14,000,000 square kilometres (5,400,000 square miles), it is the fifth-largest continent. For comparison, Antarctica is nearly twice the size of Australia. About 98% of Antarctica is covered by ice that averages 1.9 km (1.2 mi; 6,200 ft) in thickness, which extends to all but the northernmost reaches of the Antarctic Peninsula.
Antarctica, on average, is the coldest, driest, and windiest continent, and has the highest average elevation of all the continents. Antarctica is a desert, with annual precipitation of only 200 mm (8 in) along the coast and far less inland. The temperature in Antarctica has reached −89.2 °C (−128.6 °F), though the average for the third quarter (the coldest part of the year) is −63 °C (−81 °F). Anywhere from 1,000 to 5,000 people reside throughout the year at the research stations scattered across the continent. Organisms native to Antarctica include many types of algae, bacteria, fungi, plants, protista, and certain animals, such as mites, nematodes, penguins, seals and tardigrades. Vegetation, where it occurs, is tundra. — Wikipedia
Introduction
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Preservation
History
Although myths and speculation about a Terra Australis (“Southern Land”) date back to antiquity, the first confirmed sighting of the continent is commonly accepted to have occurred in 1820 by the Russian expedition of Fabian Gottlieb von Bellingshausen and Mikhail Lazarev. The continent, however, remained largely neglected for the rest of the 19th century because of its hostile environment, lack of resources, and isolation. — Wikipedia
History of Antarctica (Wikipedia)
Notebook from Scott of the Antarctic’s ill-fated expedition discovered 100 years later frozen in ice (ABC News)
Century-Old Notebook From Antarctic Expedition Found (Megan Gannon, Discovery, Live Science)
Library
WorldCat, Library of Congress, UPenn Online Books, Open Library
Participation
Education
Course
OER Commons: Open Educational Resources>
Community
News
The Antarctic Sun (The US Antarctic Program)
NPR, Reuters
Book
Government
US Office of Polar Programs (NSF)
Document
More…
Antarctic Sun - Science News Feed Science news items and articles displayed on the Antarctic Sun web site.
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Icefin Tests the Waters
on May 7, 2019 at 10:55 am
Navigating a robot through the frozen ocean's frigid waters was all in a day's work for the RISE UP science team. From their makeshift mission control in a small fish hut, the researchers maneuvered their underwater vehicle through the seawater below. […]
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The Dry Valleys' Briny Deep
on April 22, 2019 at 10:28 am
Hunting for groundwater has come a long way from divining rods in the days of yore. This past austral summer, scientists in Antarctica used a sophisticated and highly sensitive instrument to look for water in one of the continent's driest regions. […]
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The First Wave of the "Thwaites Invasion"
on March 18, 2019 at 5:38 pm
The U.S. and U.K.-funded International Thwaites Glacier Collaboration (ITGC) officially kicked off its science field research in January, when four researchers and their support teams set foot on a remote, fast-melting glacier in West Antarctica, establishing a beachhead for an unprecedented […]
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Penguins From SPAAAAAACCCE
on February 5, 2019 at 11:38 am
Scientists want to know how many emperor penguins there are in the world, and they're using Earth-observing satellites to count them. […]
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Stressed Out Fish?
on January 7, 2019 at 4:23 pm
Climate change is expected to be stressful on fish species worldwide: as the climate warms, so too will the oceans, putting a strain on creatures that depend on consistent water temperatures. […]