Image courtesy of Dr. Scott Ishman, Southern Illinois University at Carbondale.

From: Robert Williams
McMurdo Station, Antarctica, November 28, 2007

Microfossils in the ANDRILL core

This is an image of a zooplankton called Globocassidulina subglobosa. It is too small to be seen with the naked eye, so many scientists from the ANDRILL project are looking for it in the core using microscopes. If the scientists see lots of these plankton then they've found a clue that the sea of Antarctica may have been more productive, unfrozen and slightly warmer in the recent geological past.

Postcards from the Field: ANDRILL

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