Early life history traits of the blackfin notothen, Trematomus scotti, were investigated through otolith microincrement pattern and stomach content analyses. Post-larval specimens of 12–20 mm standard length (SL) were collected in the Bransfield Strait and adjacent waters during the 2010–11 summer. Catches were unevenly distributed across the surveyed area, yielding a relative abundance of 0.3–3.6 specimens per 1000 m3 of filtered sea water. Age estimates ranged from 34 to 67 days, with good consistency and no apparent bias between readings. Based on an exponential model fitted to the age-length dataset, the growth rate was 0.17 mm day-1, corresponding to a daily percentage increment in size of 1.07% SL. In agreement with previous studies, larval hatching occurred at a mean size of 9.0 mm and was spread over a relatively short period, lasting from late December to late January. Prey composition consisted exclusively of copepods, mainly larval stages of copepodites. Feeding intensity ranged from 1–14 prey items per stomach, being positively correlated with larval fish size. In summary, T. scotti shares a common early life history strategy with several other notothenioids, consisting of small larvae hatching in summer and overwintering as pelagic early juveniles until the following summer season.

The extreme working and living conditions at Antarctic stations cause numerous psychological changes in expeditioners. However, research on the changes in expeditioners' personality traits is virtually non-existent. Therefore, the present study aims to determine the changes in expeditioners' personality measures during 1 year Antarctic expeditions. This study examined 56 expeditioners working at the Ukrainian Antarctic Akademik Vernadsky station (52 men, 4 women; ages 20–63 years, M = 38.12, SD = 10.01) who participated in five annual expeditions between 2016 and 2021. The Ukrainian adaptations of four measures were used: the Thomas-Kilmann Conflict Mode Instrument, the Eysenck Personality Questionnaire, the Leonhard-Schmieschek Questionnaire and the Leary Interpersonal Checklist. During 1 year Antarctic expeditions, 8 of the 26 indicators used to describe expeditioners' personality measures changed significantly (P < 0.001–0.1). These indicators belonged to three of the four measures used in the study and were assessed as personally unfavourable. They included increased psychoticism and competing, managerial-autocratic, aggressive-sadistic, responsible-hypernormal, competitive-narcissistic and self-effacing-masochistic styles and a decreased accommodating style. Based on these results, promising areas for further research that could improve psychological selection, training and work for Antarctic expedition personnel are outlined.

We report apatite fission-track and 10Be terrestrial cosmogenic nuclide (TCN) dating of 14 moraine boulders originating from inland Terre Adélie, East Antarctica. These data show cooling of the Proterozoic Terre Adélie craton at < ~120°C between 350 and 300 Ma, suggesting > 4 km temperate glacial erosion during the Late Palaeozoic Ice Age, followed by nearly null Mesozoic erosion and low glacial erosion (< 2 km) in the Cenozoic. Based on glacial flux maps, the origin of the boulders may be located ~400 km upstream. Preliminary TCN (10Be) datings of moraine boulders cluster within the last 30 ka. Cosmogenic ages from the Lacroix Nunatak suggest a main deglaciation after the Younger Dryas at c. 10 ka, while those of Cap Prud'homme mostly cluster at 0.6 ka, in agreement with an exhumation of boulders during the Little Ice Age.

The Vestfold Hills are a 400 km2, isolated ice-free oasis in eastern Antarctica featuring large areas with translucent quartz rocks that provide habitat for hypolithic microbial communities underneath. We used high-throughput DNA sequencing of 16S and 18S ribosomal RNA amplicons to characterize bacterial and eukaryotic hypolithic communities across the Vestfold Hills. We found high-level, local heterogeneity in community structure consistent with limited dispersal between hypoliths. Hypolithic communities were dominated by heterotrophic Bacteroidetes (mean bacterial relative read abundance: 56%) as well as Cyanobacteria (35%), with the eukaryote component often dominated by Chlorophyta (43%). Small but significant proportions of the variation in microbial community composition and function were explained by soil salinity (5–7%) and water availability (8–11%), with distinct taxa associated with different salinities and water availabilities. Furthermore, many inferred bacterial metabolic pathways were enriched in hypolithic communities from either dry or high-salinity sites. Vestfold Hills hypolithic habitats are likely to be local refuges for bacterial and eukaryotic diversity. Gradients in soil salinity and water availability across the Vestfold Hills, in addition to the number and diversity of lake types and fjords as potential source populations, may contribute to the observed variation in the extremophile, hypolithic microbial community composition.

Understanding of glacially driven sedimentary transport systems across the shelf to the slope and subsequently to deep sea sediment bodies along the Pacific continental margin of Antarctic Peninsula is crucial for interpreting ice sheet dynamics. Here we quantify slope-failure frequencies recorded in Pliocene core intervals of ODP Site 1095. We used the relationship between long-term sedimentation rate and marine carbon burial efficiency to calculate glacial or interglacial specific sedimentation rates. Using the decompacted average length of glacial-interglacial cycles it was possible to solve a set of linear equations to derive average half-periods of 61.59 and 59.77 kyr respectively for the time interval 5.8–3.2 Ma. The resulting frequency distribution of slope failures reflects short and rapid but cyclic ice advances every ∼375 years. Short retention times between slope loading and slope failure are supported by biogenic silica dissolution analyses. This study demonstrates the potential of the rise record to improve models of orbitally controlled size variations of the West Antarctic ice sheet and confirms the hypothesis of a highly dynamic ice sheet during the early Pliocene warm period.

The Tertiary stocks (Meander Intrusives) cropping out along the coasts of the Ross Sea were sampled for a palaeomagnetic study during the sixth Italian expedition to northern Victoria Land. Laboratory investigations concerned magnetic mineralogy and remanent magnetization. Minerals of the magnetiteulvöspinel series occur in the rocks from all stocks, with low-Ti titanomagnetite usually prevalent. Haematite and goethite occur in small amounts as alteration products. Large secondary components commonly screen the characteristic remanent magnetization and were removed by thermal or AF demagnetization at temperatures or peak-fields higher than 360°C and 20 mT respectively. A total of 10 VGPs were obtained from radiometrically dated rocks (42–22 Ma); the averaged position (69°S, 334°E; α95=9.9°) is the first middle Tertiary palaeomagnetic pole for East Antarctica, and gives evidence for a reversal in the course of the APW path. This evidence is not substantially altered by a supposed tilt-correction consistent with geophysical and geological models for the uplift of the Transantarctic Mountains. No definite conclusion about relative movements between East Antarctica and the Antarctic Peninsula can be drawn from the existing palaeomagnetic data.