Paleo Slide Set: Low Latitude Ice Cores: High Resolution Records of Climatic Change and Variability 
in the Tropics and Subtropics
The Dunde Ice Cap

The Dunde Ice Cap (pronounced Dun-duh) is extremely remote, perched on the mountain range separating 
China's highest desert, the Qaidam Basin, from its more famous counterpart, the Gobi. For over 40,000 years, 
snow has been piling up on this 60 km2 ice cap deep in China's sparsely inhabited interior. A team of 
paleoclimatologists from the United States and China came here in 1987 to uncover the climatic secrets 
locked in Dunde's icy depths. 

Photo Credits:
Peter Sloss 
NOAA/NGDC