British Antarctic Survey

The emperor penguin and Antarctic fur seal are now both Endangered, according to The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. Climate change in Antarctica is leading to changes in sea ice that are predicted to cause the emperor penguin population to halve by the 2080s, while reduced food availability has already driven a 50% reduction in the Antarctic fur seal population since 2000. The emperor penguin (Aptenodytes forsteri) has moved from Near Threatened to Endangered on the IUCN Red List.

British Antarctic Survey’s (BAS) Discovery Building at Rothera Research Station has become the first building in Antarctica to achieve an Outstanding BREEAM accreditation, the UK’s highest standard in sustainable construction awarded to just 1% of accredited projects worldwide.

“It is a particular pleasure for me to develop cooperation with British Antarctic Survey, because 30 years ago, it was a generous gift from the United Kingdom – the transfer of the Faraday Station to Ukraine that launched our national Antarctic program. The RRS James Clark Ross delivered the first Ukrainian expedition to ‘Faraday/Vernadsky’, and now the same vessel, but under the name Noosfera, flying the Ukrainian flag and with a Ukrainian crew, supported the British expedition to Rothera.

Latest from the Ice Welcome to the latest postcard from Rothera Research Station. Work is continuing at pace as the season heads towards its close. Here’s a look at what’s been happening on site through March. Discovery Building Good progress has been made inside the Discovery Building throughout the month. The open plan office and training room platform have been formally handed over to British Antarctic Survey (BAS), joining the growing list of completed spaces.

Welcome to our latest update on modernising Rothera! Work continues at pace at Rothera Research Station, Antarctica. More areas of the Discovery building, our new scientific support and operations facility, are now handed over to us as we remove some of the legacy buildings. We’ve got use of a multi-purpose area, showers and sauna, vehicles workshop mezzanine area and fabrication workshop. We’re soon to have the open plan office, power washroom and training platform.

A new study concludes that warm ocean water was the primary driver of major West Antarctic Ice Sheet retreat since the end of the last ice age 18,000 years ago. This finding reinforces concern about ongoing and future ice loss driven by today’s changing climate. The research, published this week (Monday 2 March) in the journal Nature Communications, provides the first detailed, long-term record of ocean bottom-water temperatures on the Amundsen Sea continental shelf.

25 February, 2026 Press releases Scientists studying satellite images of Antarctica have stumbled upon a discovery that sheds new light on emperor penguins – and reveals a troubling threat to their survival. Researchers from British Antarctic Survey discovered several moulting colonies by chance, after spotting distinctive brown patches along the coastline of an area of Antarctica called Marie Byrd Land.

Scientists studying satellite images of Antarctica have stumbled upon a discovery that sheds new light on emperor penguins – and reveals a troubling threat to their survival. Researchers from British Antarctic Survey discovered several moulting colonies by chance, after spotting distinctive brown patches along the coastline of an area of Antarctica called Marie Byrd Land. The timing matched up with when emperors should have been moulting, prompting the team to take a closer look.

20 February, 2026 News stories New study on the Antarctic Peninsula shows that the choices we make in the next decade will determine Antarctica’s fate for centuries A team of international scientists, including from British Antarctic Survey (BAS), has modelled the best- and worst-case scenarios for the Antarctic Peninsula as the Earth’s climate warms.

“At the moment, we’re on track for a medium to medium-high emissions future,” said Davies. “A lower emissions scenario would mean that although the current trends of ice loss and extreme events would continue, they would be much more muted than under a higher scenario. Winter sea ice would be only slightly smaller than today, and sea level contributions from the Peninsula would be limited to a few millimeters.