' For more than a century, the cause of the fluctuations in the ice sheets has remained an intriguing and unsolved mystery.' So begins a paper in the journal Science which suggests a mechanism that could explain why the polar ice caps move as they do.
John Maddox discusses with Dr N. J. Shackleton , of Cambridge University - one of the authors of the paper, and Professor B. J. Mason , Director General of the Meteorological Office, the strengths of this new account of the earth's climatic change.
Editor DAVID PATERSON followed by an interlude