A group of scientists think they can now predict when the next ice age could grip Earth, but don't worry, it's not for a very long time.

An ice age should begin in about 10,000 years, but its onset is most likely delayed due to man-made climate change, an international team of scientists found in their analysis published this week in Science.

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Scientists have long known that small changes in how Earth orbits the sun influence glacial cycles over thousands of years. This analysis is the first time anyone has been able to determine which orbital characteristic has the most influence on the start and end of ice ages, according to a news release from the University of California at Santa Barbara. The team found that the changes in the Earth's climate, from ice ages to warm periods like today called interglacial conditions, synced up to the orbital behavior.

“We were amazed to find such a clear imprint of the different orbital parameters on the climate record,” said Stephen Barker, a professor at Cardiff University in the UK, in the release. “It is quite hard to believe that the pattern has not been seen before.”

Ice cave at the Glacier 3000 on the Swiss Alps. (Getty Images/Siyue Steuber/2190501572-170667a)

The Milankovitch theory, which was proposed a century ago, says that the small variations in the Earth's orbit, its wobble and axis angle influence long-term changes in climate, and trigger the beginning and ends of ice ages.

In a review of the last nearly 1 million years, the team observed a "pattern" in the record of climate change. That observation made it possible to make predictions, too.

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The period we live in now, called the Holocene, began some 11,700 years ago when the last ice age ended. It's known as an interglacial period, or a time between ice ages. The current period should be a stable interglacial, which means the next ice age would begin in about 10,000 years, the researchers said in their findings.

Ice cave. (Getty Images/Gnagel/931543654-170667a)

“But such a transition to a glacial state in 10,000 years’ time is very unlikely to happen because human emissions of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere have already diverted the climate from its natural course, with longer-term impacts into the future,” said study co-author Gregor Knorr, of the Alfred Wegener Institute's Helmholtz Centre for Polar and Marine Research in Germany.

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Just how much of an impact humans have caused isn't yet known. The researchers will next turn their study to how anthropogenic changes will impact the start of the next ice age.

"This is vital for better informing decisions we make now about greenhouse gas emissions, which will determine future climate changes," Barker said.

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This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: A looming ice age? Scientists find a striking pattern in Earth's history.

Reporting by Jeanine Santucci, USA TODAY / USA TODAY

USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect.

Earth globe image in the header provided by NASA visibleearth.nasa.gov. Thumbnail courtesy of Getty Images/Asbe/183411985-170667a.