Once upon a time, dinosaurs roamed Antarctica and swam in its seas. Since then, life evolved as the climate cooled into the ice ages. Life will no doubt continue to evolve there as the globe now warms. But nowadays, humans are having a profound and direct effect on life in Antarctica, the sub-Antarctic islands, and the surrounding Southern Ocean, which are being invaded by a wide range of alien species including microbes, algae, fungi, bryophytes, land plants, invertebrates, fish, birds, and mammals. These species have come to survive, and in some cases dominate, terrestrial, freshwater, and marine habitats in the sub-Antarctic islands, Steven Chown of the University of Stellenbosch, South Africa, told the King of Sweden and meeting participants in the annual lecture by the Scientific Committee on Antarctic Research (SCAR) in the recent 28th Antarctic Treaty Consultative Meeting (ATCM), in Stockholm, Sweden.