WASHINGTON (AP) — Warming temperatures are forcing Antarctic penguins to breed earlier and that's a big problem for two of the cute tuxedoed species that face extinction by the end of the century, a study said.
With temperatures in the breeding ground increasing 5.4 degrees Fahrenheit (3 degrees Celsius) from 2012 to 2022, three different penguin species are beginning their reproductive process about two weeks earlier than the decade before, according to a study in Tuesday's Journal of Animal Ecology. And that sets up potential food problems for young chicks.
“Penguins are changing the time at which they’re breeding at a record speed, faster than any other vertebrate,” said lead author Ignacio Juarez Martinez, a biologist at Oxford University in the United Kingdom. "And this is important because the time at which you breed needs to coincide with the time with most resources in the environment and this is mostly food for your chicks so they have enough to grow.''
For some perspective, scientists have studied changes in the life cycle of great tits, a European bird. They found a similar two-week change, but that took 75 years as opposed to just 10 years for these three penguin species, said study co-author Fiona Suttle, another Oxford biologist.
Researchers used remote control cameras to photograph penguins breeding in dozens of colonies from 2011 to 2021. They say it was the fastest shift in timing of life cycles for any backboned animals that they have seen. The three species are all brush-tailed, so named because their tails drag on the ice: the cartoon-eye Adelie, the black-striped chinstrap and the fast-swimming gentoo.
Suttle said climate change is creating winners and losers among these three penguin species and it happens at a time in the penguin life cycle where food and the competition for it are critical in survival.
The Adelie and chinstrap penguins are specialists, eating mainly krill. The gentoo have a more varied diet. They used to breed at different times, so there were no overlaps and no competition. But the gentoos' breeding has moved earlier faster than the other two species and now there's overlap. That's a problem because gentoos, which don't migrate as far as the other two species, are more aggressive in finding food and establishing nesting areas, Martinez and Suttle said.
Suttle said she has gone back in October and November to the same colony areas where she used to see Adelies in previous years only to find their nests replaced by gentoos. And the data backs up the changes her eyes saw, she said.
“Chinstraps are declining globally,” Martinez said. “Models show that they might get extinct before the end of the century at this rate. Adelies are doing very poorly in the Antarctic Peninsula and it’s very likely that they go extinct from the Antarctic Peninsula before the end of the century.”
Martinez theorized that the warming western Antarctic — the second-fasting heating place on Earth behind only the Arctic North Atlantic — means less sea ice. Less sea ice means more spores coming out earlier in the Antarctic spring and then “you have this incredible bloom of phytoplankton,” which is the basis of the food chain that eventually leads to penguins, he said. And it's happening earlier each year.
Not only do the chinstraps and Adelies have more competition for food from gentoos because of the warming and changes in plankton and krill, but the changes have brought more commercial fishing that comes earlier and that further shortens the supply for the penguins, Suttle said.
This shift in breeding timing “is an interesting signal of change and now it’s important to continuing observing these penguin populations to see if these changes have negative impacts on their populations,” said Michelle LaRue, a professor of Antarctic marine science at the University of Canterbury in New Zealand. She was not part of the Oxford study.
With millions of photos — taken every hour by 77 cameras for 10 years — scientists enlisted everyday people to help tag breeding activity using the Penguin Watch website.
“We’ve had over 9 million of our images annotated via Penguin Watch,” Suttle said. “A lot of that does come down to the fact that people just love penguins so much. They’re very cute. They’re on all the Christmas cards. People say, ‘Oh, they look like little waiters in tuxedos.’”
“The Adelies, I think their personality goes along with it as well,” Suttle said, saying there's “perhaps a kind of cheekiness about them — and this very cartoon-like eye that does look like it’s just been drawn on.”
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FILE - Gentoo penguins nest at Neko Harbour in Antarctica, Nov. 22, 2025. (AP Photo/Mark Baker, File)
FILE - Adelie penguins stand on a block of floating ice at Yalour Islands in Antarctica, Nov. 24, 2025. (AP Photo/Mark Baker, File)
NEW YORK (AP) — Stocks slumped in morning trading on Wall Street Tuesday after President Donald Trump threatened to hit eight NATO members with new tariffs as tensions escalate over his attempts to assert American control over Greenland.
The S&P 500 fell 1.2%, pulling back further from the record it set early last week. It was the first time U.S. markets could react to the escalation from Trump, as they were closed on Monday for Martin Luther King Jr. Day.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 536 points, or 1.1%, as of 10:56 a.m. Eastern. The Nasdaq composite slumped 1.5%.
The losses were widespread and led by technology stocks, many of which already have more influence over the direction of the market because of outsized values. Retailers, banks and industrial companies also fell sharply.
Nvidia, one of the most valuable companies in the world, plunged 3%. Amazon fell 2%, JPMorgan Chase fell 0.6%, and Caterpillar lost 1%.
The energy sector eked out gains as the price of U.S. crude oil rose 1.4% to $60.19 per barrel. The price of Brent crude, the international standard, rose 1.1% to $64.69. Exxon Mobil rose 1%.
European markets and markets in Asia fell.
Trump said Saturday that he would charge a 10% import tax starting in February on goods from Denmark, Norway, Sweden, France, Germany, the United Kingdom, the Netherlands and Finland. The annual combined imports from European Union nations are greater than those from the top two biggest individual importers into the U.S., Mexico and China.
Gold prices surged 3% and silver prices soared 5.5%. Both reached for records. Such assets are often considered safe havens in times of geopolitical turmoil.
The trade tensions apparently short-circuited a recent rally in bitcoin. The cryptocurrency rose above $96,000 late last week but has dropped back to around $90,400.
Treasury yields were mixed in the bond market. The yield on the 10-year Treasury rose to 4.27% from 4.23% late Friday. The yield on the two-year Treasury fell to 3.59% from 3.60% late Friday.
Trump linked his aggressive stance on Greenland to last year’s decision not to award him the Nobel Peace Prize, telling Norway’s prime minister that he no longer felt “an obligation to think purely of Peace,” in a text message released Monday.
Trump’s message to Jonas Gahr Støre appeared to ratchet up a standoff between Washington and its closest allies over his threats to take over Greenland, a self-governing territory of NATO member Denmark.
Trump's threats have sparked outrage and a flurry of diplomatic activity across Europe, as leaders consider possible countermeasures, including retaliatory tariffs and the first-ever use of the European Union’s anti-coercion instrument.
Tariffs have been looming over the U.S. and global economies since 2024. Trump's tariff policy has been confusing and uncertain, involving the threat or implementation of tariffs and then often followed by delays or cancellations. Existing tariffs have added more pressure to already high prices on goods and the threat of more to come makes it difficult for businesses to plan ahead.
The threat of tariffs reigniting already high inflation could further complicate the Federal Reserve's job. The central bank cut its benchmark interest rate three times late in 2025 to help bolster the economy as the job market weakened. But, it has taken a more cautious view because of the risk of rising inflation, which remains above the Fed's target of 2%.
Lower interest rates on loans can help bolster economic activity, but they could also fuel inflation, which could counter any benefit from lower interest rates.
The Fed, and Wall Street, will get another update on inflation on Thursday, when the government releases the personal consumption expenditures price index, or PCE. It is the Fed’s preferred measure for inflation.
The Fed will meet next week for its policy meeting on interest rates and Wall Street is betting that the central bank will hold its benchmark interest rate steady.
Wall Street is also in the midst of the latest round of corporate earnings, which could help provide more insight into how companies are handling uncertainty from tariffs, geopolitics and cautious consumers.
Industrial and consumer conglomerate 3M slumped 6.2% after reporting mixed results for its most recent quarter. United Airlines and Netflix will report their results after the market closes on Tuesday. Companies from a wide range of industries will report their results this week, including Johnson & Johnson, Halliburton and Intel.
AP Business Writers By Yuri Kageyama and Matt Ott contributed to this report.
Specialist Anthony Matesic, left, and trader Fred Demarco work on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange, Tuesday, Jan. 20, 2026. (AP Photo/Richard Drew)
Trader Chris Lagana works on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange, Tuesday, Jan. 20, 2026. (AP Photo/Richard Drew)
Trader Vincent Napolitano, left, on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange, Tuesday, Jan. 20, 2026. (AP Photo/Richard Drew)
Morning commuters pass the New York Stock Exchange, Tuesday, Jan. 20, 2026. (AP Photo/Richard Drew)
Morning commuters pass the New York Stock Exchange, Tuesday, Jan. 20, 2026. (AP Photo/Richard Drew)
Options trader Steven Rodriguez works on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange, Friday, Jan. 16, 2026. (AP Photo/Richard Drew)
Options trader Kirk Katzburg, center, works on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange, Friday, Jan. 16, 2026. (AP Photo/Richard Drew)
FILE - President Donald Trump speaks with reporters before boarding Air Force One at Lehigh Valley International Airport in Allentown, Pa., Aug. 3, 2025. (AP Photo/Julia Demaree Nikhinson, File)
A person walks in front of an electronic stock board showing Japan's Nikkei index at a securities firm Monday, Jan. 19, 2026, in Tokyo. (AP Photo/Eugene Hoshiko)
People walk in front of an electronic stock board showing Japan's Nikkei index at a securities firm Monday, Jan. 19, 2026, in Tokyo. (AP Photo/Eugene Hoshiko)
Currency traders work near a screen showing the Korea Composite Stock Price Index (KOSPI), right, and the foreign exchange rate between U.S. dollar and South Korean won at the foreign exchange dealing room of the Hana Bank headquarters in Seoul, South Korea, Tuesday, Jan. 20, 2026. (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon)
People walk in front of an electronic stock board showing Japan's Nikkei index at a securities firm Monday, Jan. 19, 2026, in Tokyo. (AP Photo/Eugene Hoshiko)
A currency trader reacts near a screen showing the Korea Composite Stock Price Index (KOSPI) and the foreign exchange rate between U.S. dollar and South Korean won, left, at the foreign exchange dealing room of the Hana Bank headquarters in Seoul, South Korea, Tuesday, Jan. 20, 2026. (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon)
