Captain Scott’s attempts to reach the South Pole ended in tragedy on his second expedition in 1912. He and his four men died on the return journey after the Norwegian explorer Roald Amundsen won the race the previous year. But Scott’s expeditions did produce some of the finest scientific surveys ever undertaken by any polar explorer. These are now proving priceless for polar scientists.
“Scott’s biological collections are considerable in quality and quantity,” explained Dave Barnes, of the British Antarctic Survey. “Few biological studies in Antarctica go back more than 30 years, so these data are invaluable.”
Among the specimens from Scott’s collection are tiny coral-like sea creatures known as bryozoans that live on the seabed of the Ross Sea of Antarctica. Bryozoans make a coat of hard calcium carbonate, laid down in yearly growth rings rather like the rings in trees. A survey by the British Antarctic Survey (BAS) examined Scott’s collections of bryozoans dating back to 1901 and compared them with specimens collected since then. Reporting in the journal Current Biology, the BAS revealed that the growth of the bryozoans has exploded since the 1990s.
It is thought that the upsurge in growth has resulted from a bonanza in phytoplankton, the tiny marine algae that bryozoans feed on, and which bloom in huge numbers each year in the Ross Sea. These blooms now last for much longer than in the past, although it is not clear why.
Whatever the cause, it could have implications for climate change. Because the bryozoans are growing so profusely, they are absorbing more carbon. As sea currents wash over them, they break up and become buried in the seabed, and this removes a large amount of their carbon — the more these creatures grow, the more carbon becomes locked away in the seafloor. This creates what is known as a carbon sink, helping to counteract the rising levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.
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Captain Scott could never have imagined that his expeditions would prove so valuable.