This 640 x 331 pixel image shows that Antarctica is heating up, and the evidence is in the ice--or at least in its melt. One satellite image from this past January (left) shows the spidery-looking James Ross Island surrounded by water (top right): ever since the first maps were made 100 years ago, it has been connected to the Antarctic peninsula by an ice shelf. The image also shows the peninsula, composed of a chain of mountains (lower left to upper right), surrounded by dark patches of sea; the gargantuan Larsen ice shelf appears at the lower left. A satellite image taken shortly after, in February (right), documented further changes. The ice shelf has retreated; a 50-mile-long iceberg has calved; and the northernmost part of the shelf, just above the center of the picture, has disappeared, creating a plume of ice rubble.
