Antarctica was once a pristine preserve, but humans are ruining it. And this past winter, the frozen continent reached record-low sea ice levels. USGS"This region is nearing a threshold of rapid landscape change," researchers noted in 2017. Pauline Askin/ReutersAnd depending on the location, that ice melt could turn up some pretty nasty stuff. What's even more worrisome is that "human impacts are disproportionately concentrated on the most environmentally significant areas of Antarctica," the researchers noted.

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