{"id":157822,"date":"2026-09-02T14:30:51","date_gmt":"2026-09-02T14:30:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/157822\/"},"modified":"2026-09-02T14:30:51","modified_gmt":"2026-09-02T14:30:51","slug":"unicorns-of-the-sea-help-scientists-spot-danger-in-the-arctic","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/157822\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018Unicorns of the sea\u2019 help scientists spot danger in the Arctic"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n Narwhals are known as \u201cunicorns of the sea\u201d for their long spiral tusks \u2014 actually teeth \u2014 which lend them a mythical appearance. But a group of these otherworldly marine mammals were recently given a decidedly earthly role: Arctic scientists.\n <\/p>\n

\n Researchers fitted six narwhals with satellite transmitters, then tracked the animals for three years as they roamed the rugged coast of East Greenland and swam deep into its labyrinthine fjord system \u2014 the largest in the world. Their job was to collect data on the state of the ocean in this remote but crucial region.\n <\/p>\n

\n The information they brought back provides yet more concerning evidence about what\u2019s happening in the Arctic. It reveals that relatively warm, salty water from the Atlantic Ocean is reaching far inside the region\u2019s fjords \u2014 giant valleys filled with water and ice \u2014 where it\u2019s able to eat into glaciers and threaten the ice sheet they protect.\n <\/p>\n

\n \u201cThe findings are very concerning, as they indicate the rapid melting of the marine-terminating glaciers,\u201d said Eric Achterberg, a professor at the GEOMAR Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research Kiel in Germany, who was not involved in the study. This new data underscores an ongoing trend, he added.\n <\/p>\n

\n \u2600\ufe0f Visit the CNN Weather app to learn how your world is warming.<\/a>\n <\/p>\n

\n East Greenland is home to significant glaciers, which drain parts of the ice sheet into the ocean. It\u2019s also the location of important ocean currents, which transport cold polar water southward to the North Atlantic, redistributing freshwater and influencing marine life.\n <\/p>\n

\n These form part of the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation, a crucial system of ocean currents<\/a> which has a huge impact on global weather and climate, but that scientists fear could be heading toward collapse. The effects would be catastrophic, including rapid sea level rise in the US, deep freezes in Europe and droughts in Africa.\n <\/p>\n

\n \u201cIn many ways, East Greenland is a bellwether for the climate changes we can expect in the North Atlantic,\u201d said Mads Peter Heide-J\u00f8rgensen, a study author and professor at the Greenland Institute of Natural Resources.\n <\/p>\n

\n Yet there is relatively little research on ocean changes in the area due to its remoteness and harsh conditions. \u201cIt\u2019s a very understudied region \u2026 so we needed more data,\u201d Heide-J\u00f8rgensen said.\n <\/p>\n

\n Sending ships is challenging and dangerous, and expensive icebreakers are needed to navigate the unpredictable ice. Narwhals, however, can reach these areas easily and do so year-round. \u201cWe can sit in front of our computers and the narwhals are swimming around in the icy waters in darkness,\u201d Heide-J\u00f8rgensen said.\n <\/p>\n

\n They can dive to depths of nearly 6,000 feet, meaning they \u201csample the entire water column,\u201d said Heide-J\u00f8rgensen. They also visit the same areas, allowing for repeated measurements to be taken.\n <\/p>\n

\"Scientists<\/p>\n

\"The<\/p>\n

\n The narwhals were caught by hunters, who ushered them into nets. The scientists then fitted them with instruments weighing less than a pound, Heide-J\u00f8rgensen said. \u201cWe developed a smaller transmitter that could reliably collect temperature and salinity for a long time and transmit that through a satellite,\u201d he said. \u201cIt doesn\u2019t harm them in any way,\u201d he added.\n <\/p>\n

\n The narwhals produced more than 2,000 observations of water temperature and saltiness between 2017 and 2020. The scientists then combined this with data from the World Ocean Database, mostly collected by ships.\n <\/p>\n

\u26c5 Get CNN Weather in your inbox<\/p>\n

The forecast is just the beginning. We\u2019ll\u202fsend you expert coverage and the stories behind the weather \u2014 so you always know more than just the number. Sign up for the newsletter<\/a><\/p>\n

\n The region is experiencing \u201cAtlantification,\u201d the study concludes, a process where relatively warm, salty water from the Atlantic Ocean pushes into Arctic seas.\n <\/p>\n

\n The scientists found a long-term trend of this warmer water flowing straight to the front of glaciers, where it is able to melt their undersides and accelerate ice loss. Atlantic Ocean water reached more than 180 miles into the fjord system in some cases, the study found. It was \u201can eye opener,\u201d said Heide-J\u00f8rgensen.\n <\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

\n Using narwhals to gather three years of data is \u201cunique and elegant,\u201d GEOMAR\u2019s Achterberg said. The study provides new insights into the melting processes in the region, he added, \u201cin particular the winter data is unique as ships cannot operate in the region during winter.\u201d\n <\/p>\n

\n Helen Coxall, a professor of marine micropaleontology at Stockholm University, who was also not involved in the study, said the narwhals provided \u201cclose to the same number of analyses in three years that humans collected in the past 130 years.\u201d\n <\/p>\n

\n The animals were able to reveal \u201cthe scale of the ocean-melt attack on parts of the Greenland Ice sheet in this region,\u201d she added, which is \u201cextremely valuable.\u201d\n <\/p>\n

\n There is a lot more to be done to unravel the ocean processes in this inhospitable slice of the Arctic, said Heide-J\u00f8rgensen, who added that this study \u201cis just a small piece in the big picture of what\u2019s going on in the entire North Atlantic.\u201d\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Narwhals are known as \u201cunicorns of the sea\u201d for their long spiral tusks \u2014 actually teeth \u2014 which…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":157823,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[5],"tags":[57],"class_list":["post-157822","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-greenland","tag-greenland"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@dk\/117201934112624024","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/157822","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=157822"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/157822\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/157823"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=157822"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=157822"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/dk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=157822"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}