Among the greatest successes of the Ocean Drilling Program were the concerted drilling efforts and exciting results recovered from the Southern Ocean (SO) surrounding Antarctica. Scientific drilling in the SO and on the Antarctic margin has recovered material from hundreds of sites for scientific analysis. The dynamic nature of ice sheet development and ice/margin interactions through time has been observed, as has the role that the SO plays in the development and persistence of Antarctic glaciation. The SO has been documented as a sensitive mixing pool of global water masses that is at times a locus of high biological sedimentation. Also, the SO has been found to contain high-resolution records of climate forcing and response, and as such may it hold clues to future climate. These results from scientific drilling over the past several decades have significantly increased the understanding of Cenozoic to decadal processes affecting oceanography and climatology of the SO and Antarctica. Now, it is important to mine these results from scientific drilling over the past several decades and thus also to provide a scientific framework for future expeditions in this region to solve unanswered questions. What, for example, was the role of iron as a biolimiting nutrient through time? How does sea ice cover relate to ventilation of the SO and thus to gas fluxes of carbon dioxide on glacial timescales? Was Antarctic glaciation related to the opening of ocean gateways, to decreases in atmospheric carbon dioxide, or to some other factor?