SciencePoles news
Recent Polar Science and Climate Change news are featured here. Our news RSS feed will inform you when news are published on this website.
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January 2012 NSIDC Sea Ice Update
06.01.2012
The National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC) released its update on sea ice conditions in the Arctic and Antarctic. A summary follows:
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Beaufort Sea Freshening from Russian River Runoff
05.01.2012
The Beaufort Sea has been becoming fresher recently due to changes in the Arctic Oscillation, causing runoff from Russia’s major rivers to be channeled in the direction of the Western Canadian Arctic.
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Unique New Species Discovered around Antarctic Hydrothermal Vents
04.01.2012
Several species new to science have been discovered inhabiting areas around deep-sea hydrothermal vents on the ocean floor along the East Scotia Ridge between the southern tip of South America and the Antarctic Peninsula. While hydrothermal vents have been studied in other parts of the world’s oceans, this is the…
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Floating Arctic University in the Making
04.01.2012
The Northern Russian port city of Arkhangelsk will host a “floating university” for Arctic research and staff training. A joint project between the Arctic Federal University (NArFU) and the Arctic Hydro-Meteorological Service, lectures and courses will be held aboard the Professor Molchanov research vessel as it conducts research in Arctic…
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CryoSat-2 Monitoring Oceans Now, Too
26.12.2011
According to the European Space Agency, its CryoSat-2 satellite will soon be used to monitor sea conditions for marine forecasting. The satellite was launched in April 2010 to measure variations in land and sea ice thickness in the Polar Regions, and the satellite has delivered. However while the satellite’s orbit…
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Investigating Adaptation of Antarctic Worms to Warming Oceans
23.12.2011
University of Delaware researchers are currently studying how tiny worms living in the freezing sea off the coast of Antarctica have adapted to such an extreme environment as well as how they might survive as the ocean worms. Adam Marsh and colleagues from the University of Delaware’s College of Earth,…
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Antarctic Melting Linked to Tropical Ocean Temperatures
09.12.2011
According to recent research by Professor Erik Steig from the University of Washington, the accelerated melting of the Pine Island and Thwaites Glaciers in West Antarctica could be caused by a rise in sea-surface temperatures in the tropical Pacific Ocean.
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Current Arctic Sea Ice Loss Unprecedented for past 1,500 Years
25.11.2011
Scientists at Natural Resources Canada have reported in a study published in Nature that recent dramatic Arctic sea ice loss is greater than any natural variation in the past 1,500 years. The loss has been driven by a series of factors that never coincided in historical periods of major sea ice…
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Colossal Storm Hits Alaska
14.11.2011
During the second week of November, a major storm that meteorologists refer to as an “extra tropical cyclone” hit Alaska’s western coastline, pounding the region with heavy snow and unusually strong winds. The storm displaced thousands of coastal residents and left behind widespread damage, including flooding, power outages and destroyed…
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IceBridge Project Finds Major Crack in Pine Island Glacier
31.10.2011
A team of scientists participating in NASA's IceBridge mission were flying over a portion of West Antarctica's Pine Island Glacier on October 14th when they discovered a 29 km crack across the glacier’s tongue. The 80-metre wide crack is the first step in the creation of a massive new 800…
