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1. Revisiting the Last Ice Area projections from a high-resolution Global Earth System Model

   https://doi.org/10.1038/s43247-025-02034-5  

   Fol, Madeleine; Tremblay, Bruno; Pfirman, Stephanie; Newton, Robert; Howell, Stephen; Lemieux, Jean-François (December 2025, Communications Earth & Environment)

   Abstract The Last Ice Area—located to the north of Greenland and the northern Canadian Arctic Archipelago—is expected to persist as the central Arctic Ocean becomes seasonally ice-free within a few decades. Projections of the Last Ice Area, however, have come from relatively low resolution Global Climate Models that do not resolve sea ice export through the waterways of the Canadian Arctic Archipelago and Nares Strait. Here we revisit Last Ice Area projections using high-resolution numerical simulations from the Community Earth System Model, which resolves these narrow waterways. Under a high-end forcing scenario, the sea ice of the Last Ice Area thins and becomes more mobile, resulting in a large export southward. Under this potentially worst-case scenario, sea ice of the Last Ice Area could disappear a little more than one decade after the central Arctic Ocean has reached seasonally ice-free conditions. This loss would have profound impacts on ice-obligate species. 

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2. Historical Volcanic Eruptions Mitigated the Expected Rapid Arctic Sea Ice Decline Prior to 2000

   https://doi.org/10.1029/2026GL123968  

   Wang, Xinyue; Liu, Fei; Dong, Wenjie; Ding, Qinghua (June 2026, Geophysical Research Letters)

   Abstract Arctic sea ice has declined at sharply contrasting rates over the past four decades—modest before 2000 and rapid thereafter. Using observational and model evidence, we show that large tropical volcanic eruptions can trigger decade‐long Arctic sea ice recoveries, and that without the 1982 El Chichón and 1991 Pinatubo eruptions, Arctic sea ice would have declined approximately 1.5 times faster before 2000. We further show a model's sensitivity to volcanic aerosol forcing scales with its sensitivity to GHG forcing across CMIP6 models, offering a new strategy to identify models with realistic climate response to radiative forcing. Following this, a selected subgroup of models that accurately simulate long‐term warming trend and decade‐long post‐Pinatubo recovery project ice‐free Arctic summer up to 20 years earlier than the full ensemble. These findings underscore the critical, yet underappreciated, importance of evaluating climate models against anthropogenic and volcanic forcing when projecting the future of Arctic sea ice. 

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3. Arctic Sea Ice Loss Weakens Northern Hemisphere Summertime Storminess but Not Until the Late 21st Century

   https://doi.org/10.1029/2022GL102301  

   Kang, Joonsuk M; Shaw, Tiffany A; Sun, Lantao (May 2023, Geophysical Research Letters)

   Abstract Observations show Arctic sea ice has declined and midlatitude storminess has weakened during Northern Hemisphere (NH) summertime. It is currently unclear whether Arctic sea ice loss impacts summertime storminess because most previous work focuses on other seasons. Here we quantify the impact of Arctic sea ice loss on NH summertime storminess using equilibrium and transient climate model simulations. The equilibrium simulations show mid‐to‐late 21st century Arctic sea ice loss weakens summertime storminess, but only in the presence of ocean coupling. With ocean coupling, the equator‐to‐pole temperature and atmospheric energy gradients significantly weaken due to increased surface turbulent flux in the polar region following Arctic sea ice loss. The transient simulations show Arctic sea ice loss does not significantly weaken summertime storminess until the late 21st century. Furthermore, Arctic Amplification, which is dominated by Arctic sea ice loss in the present day, does not significantly impact the present‐day weakening of summertime storminess. 

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4. Evolution of sediment temperature, pressure, phases distribution, carbon pools and seabed methane flux at the Arctic continental Shelves since the Last Glacial Maximum

   https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.8428754  

   You, Kehua (January 2023, Zenodo)

   This dataset are produced by a manuscript (Biodegradation of Ancient Organic Carbon Fuels Seabed Methane Emission at the Arctic Continental Shelves)  to be submitted to the Journal of Geophysical Research - Global Biogeochemical Cycles.  I The file "MethaneEmission_Permafrost" contains the predicted  temperature, pressure, pore water salinity, ice stable zone, methane hydrate stable zone, ice saturation, methane hydrate saturation, free methane gas saturation, labile organic carbon content, stable organic carbon content, and methanogenesis rate from seafloor to 1200 m depth from 18,000 years before present to 2,000 years after present for 8 different simulation scenarios.  The file "Seabed_Methane_Flux" contains the predicted seabed methane emission rate from 18,000 years before present to 2,000 years after present for 8 different simulation scenarios.  Detailed information about the model could be found in the paper Biodegradation of Ancient Organic Carbon Fuels Seabed Methane Emission at the Arctic Continental Shelves.    

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5. Cosmic dust reveals dynamic shifts in central Arctic sea-ice coverage over the past 30,000 years

   https://doi.org/10.1126/science.adv5767  

   Pavia, Frank J; Farmer, Jesse R; Gemery, Laura; Cronin, Thomas M; Treffkorn, Jonathan; Farley, Kenneth A (November 2025, Science)

   Arctic sea-ice loss affects biological productivity, sustenance in coastal communities, and geopolitics. Forecasting these impacts requires mechanistic understanding of how Arctic sea ice responds to climate change, but this is limited by scarce long-term records. We present continuous 30,000-year reconstructions of sea-ice coverage from the Arctic Ocean based on measurements of two isotopes, thorium-230 and extraterrestrial helium-3, whose burial ratio changes with sea-ice coverage. We found that the central Arctic was perennially covered by sea ice during the last glaciation. Sea-ice cover retreated during the deglaciation approximately 15,000 years ago, culminating in seasonal sea-ice coverage in the warm early Holocene, before ice coverage increased into the late Holocene. Sea-ice changes closely correlate with biological nutrient consumption, supporting projections of a nutrient-starved central Arctic Ocean with continued sea-ice loss. 

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