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This paper discusses the state of the Arctic cryosphere during the second half of the twentieth century and describes major findings of observational evidence since the 1950s. Although glaciers have been retreating steadily from their Little Ice Age maximum positions for decades, Arctic sea ice extent and thickness began to decline and loss of mass from the Greenland ice sheet accelerated only in the 1990s. Rapid changes in cryospheric components have occurred in this century, affecting snow cover, Arctic sea ice extent, the mass balance of the Greenland ice sheet, and frozen ground temperatures. Projections for this century, based on model results from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, involve dramatic changes by 2100. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Developed is the large-scale model of the dynamics of the Arctic sea ice cover area based on the formal concepts of the dynamics of the components of the limited-area binary system. Proposed is the technique for its parametric identification. It is demonstrated that the distribution of the monthly mean values of the sea ice area for the period of 1972-2013 is defined with the high degree of accuracy as being close to the seasonal, annual, and 60-year components. Presented is the forecast of the sea ice area for 2014-2113. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]