West Antarctic Ice Sheet Divide (WAIS Divide) Ice Core

WAIS Divide is a United States deep ice coring project in West Antarctica funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF). The purpose of the WAIS Divide project is to collect a deep ice core covering approximately one glacial cycle from the ice divide in central West Antarctica.

The WAIS Divide ice core will provide Antarctic records of environmental change with the highest time resolution for the last ~100,000 years and will be the first Southern Hemisphere climate record of comparable time resolution and duration to the Greenland GISP2, GRIP, and North GRIP ice cores.

The main science objectives of the WAIS Divide project are the following:
	Develop the most detailed record of greenhouse gases possible for the last 100,000 years
	Determine if the climate changes that occurred during the last 100,000 years were initiated by changes in the northern or southern hemisphere
	Investigate the past and future stability of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet
	Investigate the biology of deep ice

Latest News & Information

NEW! Draft WAIS Divide Basal Science and Implementation Plan Now Available for Community Comment

The draft WAIS Divide Basal Science and Implementation Plan is available for community input. On October 3 the Executive Committee will meet to discuss both the Basal Sampling and the Replicate Coring and Borehole Logging Science and Implementation Plans. More...

NEW! 2008 Science Meeting Details

The 2008 WAIS Divide science meeting will be held at the Sheraton Denver West Hotel in Lakewood, CO on 1-2 October 2008. Please note that the dates for the meeting have moved forward a day. The meeting is on Wednesday and Thursday. More...

NEW! Design Modifications for Recovering 4-Meter Ice Cores with the DISC Drill

Ice Coring and Drilling Services has released a white paper on design modifications they are evaluating for the purpose of increasing the lengths of core they can recover with the DISC drill to 4 meters. Download the White Paper...

Draft Replicate Coring and Borehole Logging Science and Implementation Plan Now Available for Community Comment

The draft Replicate Coring and Borehole Logging Science and Implementation Plan is available for community input. All comments should be sent to Dr. Jeff Severinghaus (jseveringhaus "at" ucsd.edu) by Sept. 30. More...

Dear Colleague Letter - WAIS Divide Basal Sampling

Dear Colleagues,
We would like to draw attention of the Antarctic geology, glaciology, geochemistry, and microbiology communities to the potential opportunity for coring subglacial materials at the WAIS Divide ice core site in January 2012 or later. More...

Calendar

WAIS Divide Ice Core Project



	This site is administered by the WAIS Divide Ice Core Project Science Coordination Office (Desert Research Institute and University of New Hampshire) This material is based on work supported by the National Science Foundation under award OPP-0440817 to the Desert Research Institute, Nevada System of Higher Education. Any opinions, findings, conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation.
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