This image released on March 7, 2007 displays a portion of the natural color mosaic over McMurdo Station, the largest research base in Antarctica. Ross Island is roughly 45 miles across at its widest point. In support of the International Polar Year (2007-2008), the new Landsat Image Mosaic of Antarctica (LIMA) provides a comprehensive view of Antarctica. The USGS, the British Antarctic Survey, and NASA, with funding from the National Science Foundation, are developing the new mosaic along with an Antarctic web portal and online map viewer. (Xinhua/Reuters Photo)

    LOS ANGELES, May 16 (Xinhua) -- Warm temperatures caused extensive areas of snow to melt in west Antarctica in January 2005, according to a new study.

    It was the first widespread Antarctic melting ever detected, said the study conducted by a team of scientists at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) and the University of Colorado.

    Combined, the affected regions encompassed an area as big as California, according to the study.

    Using data from NASA's QuikScat, the scientists measured snowfall accumulation and melt in Antarctica and Greenland from July 1999 through July 2005.

    The observed melting occurred in multiple distinct regions, including far inland, at high latitudes and at high elevations, where melt had been considered unlikely.

    Evidence of melting was found up to 560 miles (about 900 km) inland from the open ocean, farther than 85 degrees south ¨C about 310 miles (about 500 km) from the South Pole -- and higher than 6,600 feet (about 2,012 meters) above sea level.

    Maximum air temperatures at the time of the melting were unusually high, reaching more than 5 degrees C in one of the affected areas, according to the team. They remained above melting for approximately a week.

    The 2005 melting was intense enough to create an extensive ice layer when water refroze after the melting. However, the melting was not prolonged enough for the melt water to flow into the sea, said the researchers.

    Changes in the ice mass of Antarctica, Earth's largest freshwater reservoir, are important to understanding global sea level rise, say scientists. Large amounts of Antarctic freshwater flowing into the ocean also could affect ocean salinity, currents and global climate.

    "Antarctica has shown little to no warming in the recent past with the exception of the Antarctic Peninsula, but now large regions are showing the first signs of the impacts of warming as interpreted by this satellite analysis," said Konrad Steffen, director of the Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences at the University of Colorado at Boulder.

    "Increases in snowmelt, such as this in 2005, definitely could have an impact on larger scale melting of Antarctica's ice sheets if they were severe or sustained over time," he said.

    While no further melting had been detected through March 2007, more monitoring is needed, scientists said.

UN kicks off 2-year-long International Polar Year

    BEIJING, March 1 (Xinhuanet) -- More than 60 nations, 3,000 snowmen-building children, top scientists, researchers and about 50,000 people will be involved in 228 projects in the broadest scientific investigation yet of the Arctic and Antarctic to chart polar regions on the front lines of global warming in a United Nations sponsored program titled International Polar Year.

China participates in International Polar Year for the first time

    BEIJING, March 1 (Xinhua) -- The China Program for International Polar Year (IPY) 2007-2008 was officially launched here on Thursday.

    While this is the fourth IPY, it is the first time China has taken part.