Study Previews Ice Sheet Melting, Rapid Climate Change

The behavior of a massive ice sheet that existed in northern Europe at the end of the last Ice Age has been outlined for the first time, and researchers believe it may provide a sneak preview of how major ice sheets in Greenland and Antarctica will act in the face of global warming.

The study, which will be published Friday in the journal Science by researchers from Oregon State University, shows that ice sheets can react quite differently depending on the climatic conditions at the time global warming occurs — sometimes actually growing larger and sometimes rapidly disappearing, depending on whether increased snow offsets melting effects, or not.

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