The Second Deep Ice Coring Project at Dome Fuji, Antarctica

Throughout the history of the polar icecaps, dust and aerosols have been transported through the atmosphere to the poles, to be preserved within the annually freezing ice of the growing ice shields. Therefore, the Antarctic ice sheet is a "time capsule" for environmental data, containing information of ancient periods of Earth's history. To unravel this history and decode cycles in glaciations and global change is among the major goals of the Dome Fuji Ice Coring Project.

With an elevation of 3810 m, Dome Fuji (39°42'E, 77°19'S) is the second highest dome summit on the Antarctic ice sheet and might be one of the locations holding the oldest ice in Antarctica. The base of the ice underneath Dome Fuji is estimated to have formed at the beginning of the glacial cycle in the Quaternary era. Analysis of this ice can shed light on the mechanism of Quaternary glacial cycles. The second deep ice coring project at Dome Fuji, Antarctica reached a depth of 3028.52 m (3810 m above sea level) during the austral summer season in 2005/2006 (Figs. 1 and 2). The recovered ice cores contain records of global environmental changes going back about 720,000 years. During the recent 2006/2007 season the Japanese Antarctic Research Expedition (JARE) team finally reached a depth of 3035.22 m at the Dome Fuji station on 26 January 2007.