News

This week 160 researchers, research leaders, representatives from the Norwegian Research Council, stakeholders, industry, management and international cooperation partners were gathered in Tromsø. Amonst them AWI director Prof Antje Boetius and Arcitc scientist Dr Michael Karcher, both members of the project's Advisory Board. 

The Arctic sea ice continues to dwindle: Since the 1970s, when satellites first began monitoring the white sheet covering the Arctic Ocean, its February extent was never as small as it was this year. The reason: warm air intrusions, which are not only hitting the Arctic more frequently, but are also intensifying and reaching farther north.

A team led by geochemist Dr. Katharina Pahnke from Oldenburg has discovered important evidence that the rise in atmospheric carbon dioxide levels at the end of the last ice age was triggered by changes in the Antarctic Ocean. The researchers from the University of Oldenburg's Institute for Chemistry and Biology of the Marine Environment (ICBM), the Max Planck Institute for Marine Microbiology in Bremen and the Alfred Wegener Institute, Helmholtz Centre for Polar and Marine Research (AWI) were able to demonstrate that the deep South Pacific was strongly…

A team of scientists, led by British Antarctic Survey (BAS), heads to Antarctica to investigate a mysterious marine ecosystem that’s been hidden beneath an Antarctic ice shelf for up to 120,000 years.

Making climate research accessible – it was with this goal in mind that the Alfred Wegener Institute released the magazine “Tracking Changes”. In articles, interviews and infographics, readers will come to realise why pursuing climate research in the polar regions is so vital. Further, the engaging and highly informative read will make them ideally prepared for the next time they find themselves in a discussion about climate change.

Storing carbon dioxide (CO2) deep below the seabed is one way to counteract the increasing concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere. But what happens if such storage sites begin to leak and CO2 escapes through the seafloor? Answers to this question have now been provided by a study dealing with the effects of CO2 emissions on the inhabitants of sandy seabed areas.

On the basis of a unique global comparison of data from core samples extracted from the ocean floor and the polar ice sheets, AWI researchers have now demonstrated that, though climate changes have indeed decreased around the globe from glacial to interglacial periods, the difference is by no means as pronounced as previously assumed. Until now, it was believed that glacial periods were characterised by extreme temperature variability, while interglacial periods were relatively stable. The researchers publish their findings advanced online in the…

Since its first meeting in The Hague on 3-5 February 1958, SCAR has grown an international network of thousands of scientists who share a common ambition to carry out Antarctic science for the benefit of society. The former AWI-director Prof. Dr. Karin Lochte is the committee’s Vice President for Capacity Building, Education and Training.

Fourteen partners from thirteen countries including two North American partners from USA and Canada have joint forces to improve the capacities for marine-based research in the ice-covered Arctic Ocean. In the project “ARICE- Arctic Research Icebreaker Consortium”, they aim at better coordinating the existing polar research fleet, at offering scientists access to six research icebreakers and at collaborating closely with the maritime industry. The European Commission funds the project, which is coordinated by the German Alfred Wegener Institute,…

With the arrival and unloading of the EDEN ISS greenhouse at the edge of the Antarctic ice shelf, the construction process has begun. In the coming weeks, a team from the German Aerospace Center (Deutsches Zentrum für Luft- und Raumfahrt; DLR) will set up the greenhouse, designed for extreme environments, just 400 metres from the German Neumayer Station III in the Antarctic. It will be run by the Alfred Wegener Institute (AWI), which is working on the EDEN ISS project together with DLR.