Research Objectives:
Terrestrial fossils recovered from the Meyer Desert Formation are providing paleoclimatic information about the interior of Antarctica before the growth of the great ice sheets. The site is located on the Upper Beardmore Glacier, about 500 kilometers from the South Pole. Southern beech wood and leaves were discovered many years ago, but since 1995, the fossils have included the seeds of several species of vascular plants, including buttercups; the stems and leaves of several species of mosses; body parts of beetles; a puparium of a higher fly; shells of freshwater mollusks; valves of an ostracod; and a fish tooth. The largest fossils at the site are cushions of vascular plants buried in their growth positions by sediments of glacial outwash. These sediments were deposited in stream channels and shallow pools associated with moraines that had been colonized by tundra-like vegetation harboring insects and mollusks. The fossils provide the best evidence so far of how much heat the atmosphere near the South Pole can hold.
Although the fossils are fragmentary, they are more closely related to living terrestrial and freshwater organisms than any other fossils found in Antarctica. They are most probably the direct descendants of an ancient biota that was part of Gondwanaland. Until the discovery of the Meyer Desert Formation, no fossils of terrestrial organisms, except for pollen and spores, were available to answer questions about the evolutionary relationships between organisms distributed in southern South America, Australia, New Zealand, and the subantarctic islands.
We will revisit the Meyer Desert Formation to locate and sample new fossiliferous horizons, construct an accurately scaled and correlated cross-section of the complex facies, and collect samples for a pilot project to date the deposits directly. Collectively, these studies will provide information that should help address larger questions about the size and dynamics of the East Antarctic Ice Sheet during the Neogene.
There is extensive public interest in Antarctica, in part because of the romance of exploration but also because of the threat of global warming and the potential instability of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet. Because Antarctica exerts a huge influence on the Earth's climate, oceanic circulation, and sea level, knowledge about warmer climates during the Neogene is vital.
