News

Currently the yearly General Assembly of the European Geological Union takes place in Vienna, Austria. Dr. Olaf Eisen from the German Alfred Wegener Institute presents results from an environmentally friendly measurement method that he and his colleagues used on an Antarctic ice-shelf for the first time in early 2010. It supplies data that are input to models for the ice mass balance and thus permit better forecasting of future changes in the sea level.

Professor Peter Lemke of the Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine Research in Bremerhaven has been awarded the 50,000 € “Bayer Climate Award 2010” by the Bayer Science & Education Foundation. He is being honoured for his groundbreaking research and pioneering contributions to the understanding of the role of sea ice in the climate system.

Fragments of the Ross Ice Shelf, which drift past the edge of the Ekstrom Ice Shelf in Antarctica, have a long trip around the Antarctic continent behind them. Recently an iceberg collided with the ice shelf, dislodging a large chunk as well as causing extensive cracks of some distance in the ice shelf. Scientists of the Alfred Wegener Institute are expecting new and valuable insights with regard to ice physics.

Today scientists at the Center for Scientific Diving of the Biological Institute Helgoland start a project that is unique thus far for the North Sea: “MarGate”, an innovative underwater experimental field. In future, scientists want to acquire marine biology data with a high resolution in terms of time and space there by means of state-of-the-art sensor technologies. These data will then be available online via the Internet.

Hydraulic lifting devices prevent Neumayer Station III from sinking in the ice. The snow and ice surface in the Antarctic grows continuously so the research station has to be raised annually. The construction concept and technology prove effective right from the beginning.

The Institute established the organisation “Friends of the Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine Research” in 2009. All those interested can obtain information and support research financially and morally in the future.

On 26 January 2010 the research vessel Polarstern docked in Wellington, New Zealand for the first time. This marked the end of the two-month leg of an expedition with a marine geological focus that started in Punta Arenas, Chile. Representatives of the research community and the political sphere took advantage of the short stop in the port to share experiences and ideas and intensify the good cooperation within the framework of a reception on board.

The first comprehensive review of the state of Antarctica’s climate and its relationship to the global climate system is published this week by the Scientific Committee on Antarctic Research (SCAR).

The Arctic regions are essential for the global climate and for the ecology of the oceans. Their research is crucial to reconstruct former climate systems and to predict future climate development. German and Russian researchers cooperate closely for this purpose. This cooperation has an institutionalized framework since ten years: the Otto Schmidt Laboratory in Saint Petersburg. Researchers from Kiel and Bremerhaven and representatives from the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research receive prestigious Russian awards during today’s…

Reseach aircraft Polar 5, operated by the Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine Research in the Helmholtz Association, took off towards Antarctica on Thursday November 12th. Polar 5 will be used in three research programmes in the season 2009/10 and it will logistically support the established Antarctic flight network DROMLAN (Dronning Maud Land Air Network) as well as various field programmes. Including the flight towards Antarctica and back, Polar 5 will probably absolve around 375 flying hours in connection with the expedition.