This article has been reviewed according to Science X's editorial process and policies. Editors have highlighted the following attributes while ensuring the content's credibility: The fight against climate change has a new, spiral-tusked ally: the narwhal. In a study published in Science Advances, researchers equipped six of the toothed whales, sometimes called "unicorns of the sea," with satellite transmitters and had them explore remote East Greenland waters.
From 2017–2020, these "unconventional collaborators" retrieved more than 2,000 invaluable observations of temperature and salinity that helped show how warm Atlantic water is penetrating deep into the region's fjords and intensifying glacial melt, in turn affecting critical global weather systems. "We have used a completely novel technique," Mads Peter Heide-Jorgensen, a professor at the Greenland Institute of Natural Resources and first author of the paper, told AFP. With the narwhals plumbing the cold depths of the Arctic Ocean, "we can sit at our warm offices and drink coffee while the data comes in," he added.
Freshwater from melting glaciers in East Greenland's spectacular fjords and coastal shelf contribute to two major Arctic currents. One of these, the East Greenland Current, is a key regulator of the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC), a massive conveyor belt of ocean currents. Scientists believe that if the AMOC eventually collapses, it could trigger profound cooling during Europe's winters, plunging the continent into deep freezes.
It is therefore imperative to better understand the impact of "Atlantification" of East Greenland waters, but the remote, harsh environment has made it costly and difficult for researchers to reach the area. Traditionally, measurements were performed by crews on ships that sampled water columns for salinity data, Heide-Jorgensen said. More recently, it has been possible to set up electronic sensors, but that has normally been confined to summer, when the waters are open.
Icebreaker ships are relatively few, and they are prohibitively expensive. Their crews are at risk if the ships are damaged, and the vessels could capsize if they are in the vicinity of giant ice chunks breaking off glaciers, a process called calving. The narwhals, on the other hand, proved themselves adept scientists.
Diving to depths of more than 1,500 meters (4,900 feet), they could sample entire water columns, taking readings of temperature and salinity as well as depth and position that were then converted into a measure of potential density. Depending on this density, the water was determined to be either Atlantic or polar in origin. One of their key findings was that Atlantic-origin water was detected deep beneath glaciers in the Scoresby Sound fjord complex, 350 kilometers (220 miles) inland.
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