The neXtSIM model is currently being developed at the Nansen Environmental and Remote Sensing Center, and is unique among sea
ice models owing to its rheological framework that is based on solid mechanics and allowing to reproduce the multifractal scaling invariance of sea ice deformation with an unprecedented realism.
Such
models also indicate that warming would initially cause the Antarctic
ice sheet as a whole to gain mass
owing to an increased accumulation of snowfall (*; some recent studies find no significant continent - wide trends in accumulation over the past several decades; Lemke et al., 2007 Section 4.6.3.1).