here on board assessing anthropogenic impacts on the marine ecosystem on our way from Bremerhaven to Fram Strait (and back) and at HAUSGARTEN observatory.

the research icebreaker Polarstern returned from its roughly one month-long Arctic expedition to the Fram Strait between Greenland and Spitsbergen. In the so-called Hausgarten of the Alfred Wegener Institute

oceanographic measurements and biological research in the water column and on the seafloor of the Fram Strait between Greenland and Svalbard.

Arctic Ocean
In the summer months, sea ice from the Arctic drifts through Fram Strait into the Atlantic. Thanks to meltwater, a stable layer forms around the drifting ice atop the more salty seawater [...] as a team of researchers led by the Alfred Wegener Institute has now determined with the aid of the FRAM ocean observation system. Their findings have just been published in the journal Nature Communications

Gelatinous zooplankton from the Fram Strait region, Arctic Ocean (Photo: Mario Hoppmann/AWI) Gelatinous zooplankton, comprising cnidarians, ctenophores and tunicates, are known to be major drivers of ecosystem [...] Using eDNA, we want to monitor “newcomers” and community changes in rapidly changing regions such as Fram Strait, the gateway to the Arctic, and the Atlantic-influenced Kongsfjorden (Svalbard). Eventually [...] get an accurate estimate of jellyfish diversity, distribution patterns and abundances. During the FramJelly project, a collaboration between AWI and GEOMAR, on PS126 (schematic below), we compared the

such changes, the research teams on board the Polarstern investigated Atlantic Water Recirculation in Fram Strait and in the marginal ice zone north of Svalbard, as well as ocean/glacier interactions off the

will focus on extended ecological fieldwork at the AWI’s deep-sea observatory Hausgarten and at the FRAM Ocean Observing System between Greenland and Svalbard. 50 researchers and a ship’s crew of 24 will

North Sea (in-house project; PIs: Claudia Lorenz (DBU stipend), Sebastian Primpke and Gunnar Gerdts) Fram Pollution Observatory / Microplastics in the Arctic (in-house project; PIs: Melanie Bergmann, Ilka

North Sea (in-house project; PIs: Claudia Lorenz (DBU stipend), Sebastian Primpke and Gunnar Gerdts) Fram Pollution Observatory / Microplastics in the Arctic (in-house project; PIs: Melanie Bergmann, Ilka

for cold-air outbreaks in the Arctic are the Fram Strait and Barents Sea. The Figure shows an example of a cold-air outbreak with convection rolls over Fram Strait caused by a low pressure system over Svalbard [...] investigated. Impact of sea ice morphology on energy and momentum transport Marginal sea ice zone (Fram Strait, near Svalbard) with drifting floes and small ridges at the floe edges. (Photo: Alfred-Weg [...] Lüpkes, J. Hartmann, and M. Raschendorfer (2005), A case study on a polar cold air outbreak over Fram Strait using a mesoscale weather prediction model , Boundary Layer Meteorol. , 117 , 301–336, doi: