International efforts to protect the Vulnerable Marine Ecosystems (VMEs) that live on cold seeps and hydrothermal vents requires methods to predict where these features might be in advance of human activity. We suggest an approach to identifying seeps and vents in the CCAMLR region that uses existing data to highlight areas of possible seep and vent communities. These hierarchical criteria can be used to reduce the accidental disturbance of seep communities. We propose a 4 level classification of indicators: Class 1 Areas: VME confirmed by recovery of organisms or observation (video, stills). This level would qualify for VME status and high levels of protection. Class 2 Areas: Seepage/venting present but VME not confirmed. These locations would have a number of indicators of active seepage but VMEs have not been identified. Class 3 Areas: Seepage suspected from geophysical, geochemical or oceanographic observations. These areas have seismic indications of shallow gas or clathrates , structures suggesting fluid escape but where bubble flares or water column plumes have not been detected or where plume has been detected but not tied to an area of sea floor. Class 4 Areas: Area or geomorphic features associated with seepage and vents. These areas are large-scale geomorphic features such as Mid-Ocean Ridge rift valleys or volcanoes where vents are likely but not yet detected. Class 3 and Class 4 areas have been mapped from 45oE to 160oE using global bathymetry grids and seismic data from the SCAR Seismic Data Library.

Lithostratigraphy, grain sizes and down-hole logs of Site 1166 on the continental shelf, and Site 1167 on the upper slope, are analyzed to reconstruct glacial processes in eastern Prydz Bay and the development of the Prydz trough-mouth fan. In eastern Prydz Bay upper Pliocene-lower Pleistocene glaciomarine sediments occur interbedded with open-marine muds and grade upward into waterlaid tills and subglacial tills. Lower Pleistocene sediments of the trough-mouth fan consist of coarse-grained debrites interbedded with bottom-current deposits and hemipelagic muds, indicating repeated advances and retreats of the Lambert Glacier-Amery Ice Shelf system with respect to the shelf break. Systematic fluctuations in lithofacies and down-hole logs characterize the upper Pliocene-lower Pleistocene transition at Sites 1166 and 1167 and indicate that an ice stream advanced and retreated within the Prydz Channel until the mid Pleistocene. The record from Site 1167 shows that the grounding line of the Lambert Glacier did not extend to the shelf break after 0.78 Ma. Published ice-rafted debris records in the Southern Ocean show peak abundances in the Pliocene and the early Pleistocene, suggesting a link between the nature of the glacial drainage system as recorded by the trough-mouth fans and increased delivery of ice-rafted debris to the Southern Ocean.

Dense coral-sponge communities on the upper continental slope (570 - 950 m) off George V Land, east Antarctica have been identified as Vulnerable Marine Ecosystems. We propose three main factors governing their distribution on this margin: 1) their depth in relation to iceberg scouring; 2) the flow of organic-rich bottom waters; and 3) their location at the head of shelf cutting canyons. Icebergs scour to 500 m in this region and the lack of such disturbance is a likely factor allowing the growth of rich benthic ecosystems. In addition, the richest communities are found in the heads of canyons which receive descending plumes of Antarctic Bottom Water formed on the George V shelf, which could entrain abundant food for the benthos. The canyons harbouring rich benthos are also those that cut the shelf break. Such canyons are known sites of high productivity in other areas due to strong current flow and increased mixing with shelf waters, and the abrupt, complex topography.

In 2007-08 scientists from Australia, Japan and France set out to survey the marine life and habitats in the region adjacent to Terre Adelie and George V Land in East Antarctica (Australian Antarctic Magazine 14: 2-13, 2008). The Collaborative East Antarctic Marine Census (CEAMARC) - part of Australia's contribution to the International Polar Year - aimed to understand the processes that have lead to the evolution and survival of marine life existing in the region today, so that scientists can predict how these organisms may respond to future climate-related changes in their environment. Scientists involved in the census are now finalising the collation and analysis of data and the following pages (13-18) provide an insight into some of the results. The team aims to publish its findings as a series of papers in a special volume of a scientific journal in late 2010.

Numerical models are the primary predictive tools for understanding the dynamic behavior of the Antarctic ice sheet. But a key boundary parameter - the magnitude of sub-glacial heat flow - is controlled by geological factors and remains poorly constrained. We show that variations in the abundance and distribution of heat producing elements (U, Th and K) within the Antarctic continental crust give rise to regional sub-glacial heat flows as much as 2-3 times greater than previously assumed in ice modeling studies. We also recognize that, prior to the breakup of Gondwana, much of the East Antarctic continental crust was contiguous with southern Australia where extensive high-heat producing Proterozoic-aged rocks, and correspondingly elevated regional heat flows, are well documented. Such crustal rocks almost certainly extend beneath the modern east Antarctic ice sheet. This means that high sub-glacial heat flows are likely to be a regional phenomenon. Such fundamental geological controls on sub-glacial heat flow must be considered in accurately modelling ice dynamics, permitting more refined predictions of ice mass balance and sea level change.

With improving accessibility to Antarctica, the need for proactive protection and management of sites of intrinsic scientific, historic, aesthetic or wilderness value is becoming increasingly important. Environmental protection and conservation practise in the Antarctic is globally unique and is managed by provisions contained within the Antarctic Treaty. Whilst these provisions have been primarily utilised to protect sites of biological or cultural significance, sites of geological or geomorphological significance may also be considered. However, in general, sites of geological and geomorphological significance are underrepresented in conservation globally, and, particularly, in Antarctica. Wider recognition of sites of geological significance in Antarctica can be achieved by development of a geo-conservation register, similar to geological themed inventories developed elsewhere in the world, to promote and recognise intrinsically valuable geological and geomorphological sites. Features on the register that are especially fragile, or otherwise likely to be disturbed, threatened or become vulnerable by human activity, can be identified as such and area management protocols for conservation, under the Antarctic Treaty, can be more readily invoked, developed and substantiated. Area management should mitigate casual souveniring, oversampling and accidental or deliberate damage caused by ill-advised construction or other human activity. The recognition of significant geological and geomorphological features within the Antarctic, and their protection, is identified under the current Australian Antarctic Science Strategic plan (under Stream 2.2; Vulnerability and spatial protection)

The sediments deposited beneath the floating ice shelves around the Antarctic margin provide important clues regarding the nature of sub-ice shelf circulation and the imprint of ice sheet dynamics and marine incursions on the sedimentary record. Understanding the nature of sedimentary deposits beneath ice shelves is important for reconstructing the icesheet history from shelf sediments. In addition, down core records from beneath ice shelves can be used to understand the past dynamics of the ice sheet. Six sediment cores have been collected from beneath the Amery Ice Shelf in East Antarctica, at distances from the ice edge of between 100 and 300 km. The sediment cores collected beneath this ice shelf provide a record of deglaciation on the Prydz Bay shelf following the last glaciation. Diatoms and other microfossils preserved in the cores reveal the occurrence and strength of marine incursions beneath the ice shelf, and indicate the varying marine influence between regions of the sub-ice shelf environment. Variations in diatom species also reveal changes in sea ice conditions in Prydz Bay during the deglaciation. Grain size analysis indicates the varying proximity to the grounding line through the deglaciation, and the timing of ice sheet retreat across the shelf based on 14C dating of the cores. Two of the cores contain evidence of cross-bedding towards the base of the core. These cross-beds most likely reflect tidal pumping at the base of the ice shelf at a time when these sites were close to the grounding line of the Lambert Glacier.

The sediments deposited beneath the floating ice shelves around the Antarctic margin provide important clues regarding the nature of sub-ice shelf circulation and the imprint of ice sheet dynamics and marine incursions on the sedimentary record. Understanding the nature of sedimentary deposits beneath ice shelves is important for reconstructing the icesheet history from shelf sediments. In addition, down core records from beneath ice shelves can be used to understand the past dynamics of the ice sheet. Six sediment cores have been collected from beneath the Amery Ice Shelf in East Antarctica, at distances from the ice edge of between 100 and 300 km. The sediment cores collected beneath this ice shelf provide a record of deglaciation on the Prydz Bay shelf following the last glaciation. Diatoms and other microfossils preserved in the cores reveal the occurrence and strength of marine incursions beneath the ice shelf, and indicate the varying marine influence between regions of the sub-ice shelf environment. Variations in diatom species also reveal changes in sea ice conditions in Prydz Bay during the deglaciation. Grain size analysis indicates the varying proximity to the grounding line through the deglaciation, and the timing of ice sheet retreat across the shelf based on 14C dating of the cores. Two of the cores contain evidence of cross-bedding towards the base of the core. These cross-beds most likely reflect tidal pumping at the base of the ice shelf at a time when these sites were close to the grounding line of the Lambert Glacier.

Climatically controlled glaciological and oceanogrphic environmental changes off the George V Coast during the Late Pleistocene and Holocene have been recontructed from changes in sedimentation processes. The evolution of a sediment drift deposit located deep in the deep trough on the shelf has been assessed using a sedimentological approach.

Multichannel seismic data collected off Wilkes Land (East Antarctica) reveal four main units that represent distinct phases in the evolution of the Cenozoic depositional environment. A Cretaceous synrift succession is overlain by hemipelagic and distal terrigenous sequences deposited during Phase 1. Sediment ridges and debris-flow deposits mark the transition to Phase 2. Unit 3 records the maximum sediment input from the continent and is characterized by the predominance of turbidite deposits. During Phase 4 the sediment supply from the continental margin was reduced, and draping and filling were the dominant processes on the continental rise. Unit 4 also contains the deposits of sediment wave fields and asymmetric channel-levee systems. These four units are a response to the Cenozoic evolution of the East Antarctic Ice Sheet. During Phase 1, small ice caps were formed in the innermost continental areas. The ice volume increased under temperate glacial regimes during Phases 2 and 3, when large volumes of melt-water production led to high sediment discharge to the continental rise. Change to a polar regime occurred through Phase 4, when a thick prograding wedge developed on the continental shelf and slope and the sediment transport to the rise diminished, producing general starvation conditions.