After studying climate fluctuations over a million years, an international team of climatologists from Cardiff and California Universities found a link between changes in the Earth's orbit, axis tilt angle and changes in ice ages.
According to calculations published in Science, the next ice age should come in 10 thousand years. However, already now cold anomalies in Russia signal the possible displacement of giant glaciers in the middle latitudes - their height can reach kilometers, MediaPotok writes.
The key discovery was the role of carbon dioxide. The gas, considered the enemy of global warming, turned out to be a “brake” for glaciation. A natural decrease in its concentration usually triggers cooling, but record emissions from industry have disrupted this mechanism. The authors of the study note that for the first time they have seen how humanity has shifted the climate into a regime unparalleled in geologic history.
Paradoxically, attempts to avoid an ice age through carbon emissions could lead to a catastrophic imbalance. Scientists emphasize - even after millennia, the consequences of today's decisions will remain in the planet's climate memory.