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The warmer Antarctica gets, the greener it gets: "Antarctica has experienced significant increases in temperature over the past 60 years," the study said. ... “Soil in Antarctica is mostly poor ...
Soils in Antarctica are nearly two-dimensional habitats, with most biological activity limited to the top four or five inches by the permanently frozen ground below. [4] Environments can be limiting due to soil properties such as unfavorable mineralogy, texture, structure, salts, pH, or moisture relationships. [5]
The frozen continent of Antarctica was the last continent humanity set foot on. The first documented landings made below the Antarctic Circle took place in 1820, when Admiral Fabian Gottlieb von Bellingshausen and the crew of the Vostok and Mirny, as part of the Russian Antarctic Expedition, made land at Peter I Island and Alexander Island.
A speculative representation of Antarctica labelled as ' Terra Australis Incognita ' on Jan Janssonius's Zeekaart van het Zuidpoolgebied (1657), Het Scheepvaartmuseum The name given to the continent originates from the word antarctic, which comes from Middle French antartique or antarctique ('opposite to the Arctic') and, in turn, the Latin antarcticus ('opposite to the north').
Western Antarctica and Eastern Antarctica correspond roughly to the western and eastern hemispheres relative to the Greenwich meridian. [note 1] West Antarctica is covered by the West Antarctic Ice Sheet. There has been some concern about this ice sheet, because there is a small chance that it will collapse. If it does, ocean levels would rise ...
There are also no birds that reside in Antarctica. Though, it has been known that various birds from South America have been spotted in Antarctica. Two studies have assessed the contributions of soil invertebrates to the polar ecosystem in Antarctica, suggesting that biotic interactions play crucial roles in such a seemingly simple ecosystem.
Before November 1956, there was no permanent artificial structure at the pole, and practically no human presence in the interior of Antarctica. The few scientific stations in Antarctica were near its coast. The station has been continuously occupied since it was built and has been rebuilt, expanded, and upgraded several times.
The continent of Antarctica is so cold that it has supported only 2 vascular plants for millions of years, and its flora presently consists of around 250 lichens, 100 mosses, 25–30 liverworts, and around 700 terrestrial and aquatic algal species, which live on the areas of exposed rock and soil around the shore of the continent.