Arctic ice had been expanding for 1,000 years before reaching its greatest extent around 1960

Reducing ice cap due to global warming. A new study suggests that the Arctic was already moving towards another glaciation nearly 2,000 years ago, before rising greenhouse gas emissions reversed the trend. Researchers found that the Barnes Ice Cap in Canada's Arctic began expanding again around that time, reaching its greatest extent in this advance around 1960. It has since retreated, reversing centuries of ice growth.Published in Science on 22 October, the study, titled Late Holocene reexpansion of the Laurentide Ice Sheet, examines the last surviving remnant of the Laurentide Ice Sheet, which once covered much of Canada and parts of the northern United States. The researchers argue that human-caused global warming overwhelmed the natural cooling influence of changes in Earth's orbit, halting the ice cap's expansion. The findings offer physical evidence of a renewed glacial advance in the Arctic.How the Arctic ice cap began growing againThe Barnes Ice Cap, located on Baffin Island in Nunavut, Canada, covers an area roughly the size of Delaware. It is the last remnant of the Laurentide Ice Sheet, which reached across much of North America during the last glacial period.According t...