Plate tectonics and polar sea straits during geological history

Water mass exchange between world oceans has a major impact on long-term global climate change. The constantly changing oceanic gateways and basins control this water exchange. Therefore, we need to reconstruct the geological history of polar oceanic basins and gateways to understand natural climate change. PLATES & GATES (Project ID No. 77) is an international programme focussing on the tectonic and sedimentary formation of those areas of the Arctic and Antarctic which are especially critical for global change. This project will start in January 2007 with an expedition to the Antarctic on board the icebreaker "Polarstern".

To a short report about project activities ...

List of all PLATES & GATES projects ...(PDF  34KB)

To the PLATES & GATES website ...