Fractal analysis of eight glacial cycles from an Antarctic ice core

A rescaled range analysis was performed on recent electrical measurements of a deep ice core obtained from Dome C, Antarctica, representing a continuous 7 40 000 year record of the Earth’s climate. It is shown that two measures of the electrical conductivity of the ice surface, both d.c. conductance and 100-kHz dielectric profile, exhibit fractal behavior over 3 orders of magnitude in ice depth. Positive Hurst exponents of 0.795 and 0.848 were calculated for the d.c. conductance and dielectric profile, respectively.