Global Warming Threatens Antarctic Sea Life Nowhere else than in our ecosystems do giant sea spiders and

marine pill-bugs share the ocean bottom with fish that have anti-freeze proteins in their blood The shell-crac!ing crabs" fishes" shar!s and rays that dominate bottom communities in temperate and tropical zones have been shut out of Antarctica for millions of years because it is simply too cold for them #ut this situation is about to change $opulations of predatory !ing crabs are already living in deeper" slightly warmer water and increasing ship traffic is introducing e%otic crab invaders When ships dump their ballast water in the Antarctic seas" marine larvae form as far away as the arctic are in&ected into the system 'ast-moving" shell crushing predators" dominant in most places" cannot operate in icy waters of Antarctica The only fish there-the ones with the anti-freeze proteins-eat small" shrimp li!e soft foods The main bottom dwelling predators are slow-moving sea stars and giant" floppy ribbon worms To understand their history" (ich Aronson" professor of #iological sciences at 'lorida )nstitute of Technology in *elbourne" and his team collected marine fossils at Seymour )sland off the Antarctic $eninsula They could reconstruct changes in the Antarctic climate from chemical signals preserved in ancient clamshells As temperatures dropped about +, million years ago thus freezing out crabs and fishes" the slow-moving predators that remained could not !eep up with their prey Snails" once out of danger" gradually lost their spines and other shell armor they had evolved against crushing predators Antarctica-s coastal waters are warming up rapidly Temperatures at the sea surface off the western Antarctic $eninsula went up a degree . in the last /0 years" ma!ing it one of the fastest-warming regions of the world ocean )f the crab invasion succeeds" it will devastate Antarctica-s spectacular fauna and fundamentally alter its ecological relationships That would be a tragic loss for biodiversity in one of the last truly wild places on earth 1nless we can get control of ship traffic and greenhouse gas emissions" climate change will ruin marine communities in Antarctica and ma!e the world a sadder" duller place Srividhya )yer .S2-# )3yr