What research is done on Antarctica?

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Twenty-eight nations now operate more than 35 year-round research stations on the continent; additional stations are operated in the summer. At McMurdo the United States has built a scientific village where people may be housed in summer and winter. From McMurdo other U.S. bases are supported by air. The National Science Foundation (NSF) finances the U.S. programs. Mapping is done by the U.S. Geological Survey. Russian research has suffered from financial difficulties after the collapse of the Soviet Union and was cut back in the 1990s. In the early 1970s fossil finds and geological studies gave further support to the theory of continental drift. Sediment samples obtained by the Ocean Drilling Project (1985) off the coast of Queen Maud Land indicate ice sheets covered E Antarctica over 37 million years ago. Since the late 1980s scientists have researched seasonal ozone depletion, or "holes," in the stratosphere above Antarctica, which allows harmful levels of ultraviolet radiation from the sun to reach the earth (see ozone layer ); they have also queried whether the rising incidence of iceberg calving in E Antarctica and increased snowfall in W Antarctica are related to global warming and climate change. In 1997, through a joint effort of NASA and the Canadian Space Agency, the first radar satellite images of the entire continent were made. These revealed new information on Antarctica's network of ice streams as well as features lying far below the surface of the ice. Since the 1990s cruise ships have plied the waters off the continent during the antarctic summer in increasing numbers.