This dataset is an international circumpolar compilation of currently available organic carbon data from Antarctic pack ice cores collected at locations around Antarctica between 1989 and 2019, covering the full seasonal cycle. These data have been collated from peer-reviewed publications, reports, and unpublished measurements from researchers and research teams from across the international scientific community working in sea-ice biogeochemistry. The dataset includes concentrations of particulate organic carbon and nitrogen, dissolved organic carbon and nitrogen as well as ancillary measurements (e.g., ice temperature, salinity and other biogeochemical measurements) where available. Observations of sea-ice properties were also taken at the time of sampling, including ice thickness, snow thickness, and freeboard level, and can be used to contextualise the biogeochemical data.
A total of 362 geo-referenced pack ice cores are included in the compilation; 139 cores from the Ross sector, 132 from the Atlantic sector, 47 from the Bellingshausen/Amundsen sector, 44 from the Pacific sector, with none from the Indian sector. The ice cores were primarily collected in austral spring (n = 171), with 110 from summer, 65 from autumn and 16 from winter.
The POC and DOC samples were measured from melted ice core sections following standard procedures (e.g., Miller et al., 2015). The POC samples were filtered onto pre-combusted glass or quartz fibre filters (typically pre-combusted GF/F with an operational pore size of 0.2 µm; Hulatt and Thomas 2010) before processing (acid fuming) and combustion in an elemental analyzer. For DOC, high-temperature catalytic oxidative analysis was typically performed on the filtrate.
Sea-ice thickness was estimated from ice core lengths, and snow depth measurements accompanied the majority (71%) of the POC and DOC measurements. Temperature and salinity profiles are available for a number of the ice cores (n = 81 and n = 313, respectively) within this dataset along with particulate and dissolved organic nitrogen (PON, n = 248 and DON, n = 104) and chlorophyll a (Chl a; n = 253) concentrations.
The data are provided in a spreadsheet in .csv format. Dalman-et-al-2025_Antarctic_pack_ice_carbon_final.csv. The spreadsheet contains all available data and supporting metadata. Each column heading is intended to be as informative as possible, and is given and described below.
These data were funded by the following bodies/projects:
Australian Antarctic Science project 4635.
This data compilation and analysis were carried out as part of the Scientific Community on Oceanic Research (SCOR) working group on Biogeochemical Exchange Processes at Sea-Ice Interfaces (BEPSII; WG-140).
This data compilation is the focus of Dalman et al., 2025, Geophysical Research Letters. This paper and the associated supplemental material provide more information about the data provided here and presents a detailed analysis of the results and scientific findings, especially in terms of utilizing it as a biomass accumulation method to estimating net community production within the sea ice. This paper should be read by any person interested in using this compiled dataset and used alongside the dataset to inform and support further analysis.
Column A – numerical order of data provided in the compilation
Cruise/Field Campaign– name of the cruise or field campaign
Station Number – number or name of sampling station
Station Date (YYYY/MM/DD) – sampling date in the format YYYYMMDD
Year – year of sample collection
Month – month of sample collection
Day – day of sample collection
Julian day - sampling date in the format julian day
Season – season according to this Antarctic seasons (write out)
Latitude – latitude of sampling location in decimal degrees
Longitude – longitude of sampling location in
Sector – sector of the Antarctic the sample came from
Ice Core ID – ice core identifier code or name, as provided
Instrument – name or description of instrument used for ice coring
Corer diameter (m) – diameter of ice corer, in metres
Ice thickness (m) – ice thickness determined from length of ice core, in metres
Snow thickness (m) – snow thickness on top of sea ice, in metres
Freeboard (m) – the difference between the height of the sea ice upper surface and the seawater surface, in metres. A positive freeboard shows that the sea ice surface is above that of seawater; a negative freeboard shows that the sea ice surface is below that of seawater
Comments (general) – any additional comments recorded by the field team
Lower limit (m) – depth of top of section for salinity measurement, from top of core, in metres
Upper limit (m) – depth of top of section for salinity measurement, from top of core, in metres
Depth (m) – depth of mid-point of core section, from top of core, in metres
Depth (%) – depth of mid-point of core section, from top of core, normalised to ice core length, in percent
Temperature (deg C) – temperature
Salinity – salinity of melted ice core section, no units
Chlorophyll a (µg.L-1) – chlorophyll a concentration of melted ice core section, in µg L-1
POC (µmol.L-1) – particulate organic carbon (POC) concentration of melted ice core section, in µmol L-1
PON (µmol.L-1) - particulate organic nitrogen (PON) concentration of melted ice core section, in µmol L-1
DOC (µmol.L-1) – dissolved organic carbon (DOC) concentration of melted ice core section, in µmol L-1
DON (µmol.L-1) – dissolved organic nitrogen (DON) concentration of melted ice core section, in µmol L-1
For questions about this dataset please contact Laura Dalman
References used in data description:
Hulatt, C. J., and Thomas, D. N. (2010). Dissolved organic matter (DOM) in microalgal photobioreactors: a potential loss in solar energy conversion? Bioresour Technol, 101(22), 8690-8697. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.biortech.2010.06.086
Miller, L. A., Fripiat, F., Else, B. G. T., Bowman, J. S., Brown, K. A., Collins, R. E., Ewert, M., Fransson, A., Gosselin, M., Lannuzel, D., Meiners, K. M., Michel, C., Nishioka, J., Nomura, D., Papadimitriou, S., Russell, L. M., Sørensen, L. L., Thomas, D. N., Tison, J.-L., . . . Ackley, S. F. (2015). Methods for biogeochemical studies of sea ice: The state of the art, caveats, and recommendations. Elementa: Science of the Anthropocene, 3. https://doi.org/10.12952/journal.elementa.000038
