Antarctica conjures up a mental image of impeccable snow, but some algae plants are giving the frozen continent an increasingly green tinge.
Rising temperatures due to climate change are helping to shape and spread "green ice", which has spread so strongly in some places that it can even be seen from space, according to new research published Wednesday.
Reuters reported that although ancient inspection flights such as that of British explorer Ernest Shackleton noticed the presence of algae in Antarctica, the extent of its spread was unknown.
Using data collected by the European Space Agency's Sentinel 2 satellite for two years and observations on the ground, a research team from the University of Cambridge and the British Antarctic Survey drew the first map of algae plants on the coast of Antarctica.
"We now have a baseline about where the algae plants are and we can see if the algae will increase in the future as the models indicate," said Matt Davy of the University of Cambridge's Department of Plant Science.
There were two types of algae considered to be the dominant organisms that perform photosynthesis in Antarctica, but the new map found 1679 types of algae growing there which is a major component of the continent's ability to absorb carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.
"It does pull out the carbon, but it won't affect much the amount of carbon dioxide that is being emitted at the moment," Davy said.
And green is not the only color that crawls on Antarctica. Researchers are now planning to prepare similar studies on red and orange algae.