The discovery of a 50,000-year-old plant in the Andes Mountains of Peru has indicated to Ohio State researcher Lonnie Thompson that global warming continues its assault on the world's tropical ice caps.
Thompson found the ancient plant on the Qori Kalis glacier of the Quelccaya ice cap, the largest tropical ice cap in the world.
The Qori Kalis glacier has been studied closely since the first aerial photographs were taken in 1963, Thompson said. Over the first 15 years of study and research the glacier receded an average of 4.7 meters per year, but from 2000 to 2002 that number skyrocketed to 205 meters per year.
Melting of the Qualccaya ice cap has diminished the water supply for the Andean people, said Blanca Leon, a researcher with the Plant Resources Center at the University of Texas at Austin and one of Thompson's colleagues.
"(The glacier) shows an exponentially increasing rate of glacial recession," Thompson said.
The melting of Quelccaya is a result of global warming.
"The earth is getting warmer. Scientists know that," Thompson said. "What is still debated is why."
Thompson said the discovery of such an old plant was quite a shock.
"I was really surprised at the age of the plant," said the OSU professor of geological sciences. "We brought back three different plants and the two others were dated to about 5,000 years ago. To my knowledge this is the oldest soft-bodied plant in the world to be discovered."
After the initial carbon-dating tests for the plant came back in the winter, Thompson had the plant tested again at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California and the results remained the same. Thompson, however, is quick to point out that carbon dating can be unreliable beyond 50,000 years, so the exact age of the plant is unknown.
"(The plant discovery) suggests that a part of the Qori Kalis ice cap has existed for over 50,000 years," said Thompson's wife, OSU geography professor Ellen Mosley-Thompson. "Parts of the ice field are older than we anticipated."
The plant has been identified as a part of the genus Distichia, Leon said.
"The plant remains are related to current plants found at a lower elevation," Leon said. "Lonnie's discovery gives a glimpse into the history of the area before the glaciers formed."
The plant gives scientists and glaciologists a benchmark for understanding the extent of the glaciers said Mary Davis, research associate for the department of geological sciences.
Thompson first ventured to the Andes in 1974 as a graduate student. He returned almost every summer since 1983 to map the ice caps and study the climate history of the area with his colleagues from the Byrd Polar Research Center at OSU. They will be heading back this summer.
"I'm intent on going back and looking at the plant community and comparing it to other more recent plant communities" Leon said.
"Science is very serendipitous," Mosley-Thompson said. "The research is far too preliminary and we need to go back."
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