Grant Award View - GA66215-V1
Old-growth mosses as proxies for past Antarctic climates
We have recently shown that the lush moss beds of the Windmill Islands, East Antarctica are rapidly drying due to cooler, windier summers caused by ozone depletion and climate change. We have developed advanced ways to analyse preserved climate records captured within these old-growth moss shoots establishing these miniature plants as accurate proxies to detect climate change in coastal East Antarctica. We propose to use similar 'moss-cores' from around Antarctica to determine whether there is more widespread drying. Long moss shoots collected from various sites around coastal Antarctica will be assessed using a combination of existing and novel methods. We will determine preserved radiocarbon and stable isotope signatures, providing a history of the region's changing climate and allowing us to determine sites where mosses are at risk of drying and dying. This will be combined with drone-based remote sensing of moss health and hydrological spatial modelling to delineate risk.