The Economist just posted an interesting article about the scientific research taking place in Ny-Ålesund, a village on the High Arctic island of Spitsbergen

The village logs some 14,000 researcher-days a year: the scientists normally come and go on twice-weekly flights from Longyearbyen, about 110km away, except for those who arrive on research ships, or on the vessels that bring in provisions and fuel to replenish the stocks in the rather rusted tanks that stand up above the jetty. A few dozen of them spend the winter up here. “The midnight sun is one thing,” one of the select few boasts, “but the full moon at noon is rarer and finer.”

The article highlights how this small village, at the near-top of the world, is at once isolated from and connected to the world below, drawing researchers from around the world and generating data that speaks to our shared environment, where no single country or individual is ever truly isolated from the larger world.

The Arctic is the world’s attic: a lot of junk lofted high into the atmosphere farther south ends up there. And the facilities for studying it all, especially those high above the settlement in the laboratory at the summit of Mt Zeppelin, away from any local disturbances, are exquisitely sensitive. Some of these instruments form part of the world’s network for monitoring carbon dioxide levels. Others monitor methane, carbon monoxide, ozone, lead, and all sorts of particles. Some bottle up air for yet more meticulous examination far away, in Britain, or in Boulder, Colorado. Kim Holmen of the Norwegian Polar Institute says some of his equipment could detect a cigarette at 2km. Through their careful monitoring he and his colleagues connect themselves to conflagrations a great deal farther away than that, picking up industrial pollutants and forest fires from all parts of Eurasia.

via Green.view: The connected Arctic | The Economist.

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The jawbone of a fully grown male polar bear, believed to be somewhere between 110,000 and 130,000 years old, is giving scientists a rare glimpse into polar bear evolution.

Polar Bears: Younger than they look

DNA from the jawbone, which was discovered in Svalbard by researcher Olafur Ingolfsson of the University of Iceland in 2004, shows that polar bears are a relatively young species, having split from brown bears approximately 150,000 years ago and evolved rapidly during the climate changes that took place during the late Pleistocene. As Ingolfsson notes, in an email quoted on the New York Times’ Dot Earth blog,

I think our find shows that polar bears have been around for a while, and they probably have survived situations in the past where the Arctic was warmer and there was less seasonal sea ice than today. . .

I want to stress that we should be concerned about the polar bears’ future. There are other risks out there, mainly from chemical pollution of the Arctic (heavy metals, pcbs, etc). Also, increased traffic (oil tankers) when/if ship lanes open up across the Arctic Ocean could constitute a major threat.

Polar bear fossils are rare, as the animals spend most of their lives on the sea ice, which means that their remains rarely end up on land. The DNA taken from the jawbone gives researchers a rare glimpse into the lives of ancient polar bears. It is also the oldest mitochondrial sample from a mammal sequenced to date.

Read more:

Science Daily: Ancient DNA from rare fossil reveals that polar bears evolved recently and adapted quickly

Arctic Update: Resilient Bears, Shrinking Ice — Dot Earth Blog, NY Times.com

Unis: Oldest remains of a polar bear ever discovered.

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I just got back from Vancouver, a city abuzz with talk next month’s winter Olympics (and the hopes that it will snow in time and spring will stop its early springing!). On my way home, I opened up my in-flight magazine to find  this interesting article on the climate change research currently going on in Svalbard, Norway’s high arctic archipelago.

The article details some of the research going on in Svalbard.

For this Arctic outpost, all the science is about looking ahead. After a century wresting coal from its stratified geology, near-pristine Svalbard is seeing a new light at the end of the mineshaft. Old reptile knuckles form part of that vision. Sure, commercial mining is still the breadwinner for the islands’ 2,100 inhabitants, and Longyearbyen, the archipelago’s “capital,” is heated with coal scooped out from Mine 7 at the end of the road just east of town. But scientific sleuthing (like fossil hunts, research into CO2 capture and storage and university courses in polar ecology) accounts for an ever-larger chunk of Svalbard’s revamped economy, along with welcoming tourists hoping to immortalize a member of the 3,000-strong polar bear family. Longyearbyen made front-page news two years ago when the Svalbard Global Seed Vaultswung open its brushed steel door to 4.5 million food-crop seed samples. And in September, Ny-Ålesund, an international research base some 100 kilometres northwest of Longyearbyen, stole the spotlight when UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon dropped in to see the effects of climate change and to hear from the climate detectives working there. With all this science, Svalbard is a living lab.

The Arctic is home to some cutting-edge science, particularly on the subject of climate change. In Svalbard, some researchers are even exploring the possibility of preserving the Arctic utilizing ice-making bacteria, which can create ice at temperatures slightly above freezing. Here, in one the areas most threatened by global warming, scientists are working towards solutions that could salvage not only the Arctic, but the global climate at large. Writer Susan Nerberg explains:

When we reach the atmospheric research station close to the summit, the microbiologists from the University of East London check their equipment: a vacuum cleaner and a strip of tape mounted to capture airborne particles that might contain ice-making bacteria. “Pure water doesn’t freeze until the temperature drops to -36.5ºC,” says Moffett. (I wonder if my old science teacher knows that.) “But some micro-organisms can produce ice at temperatures as high as -1ºC.” While this discovery is already used to create artificial snow and to preserve food, the two scientists’ main interest is the potential for weather modification. The idea is that you sprinkle bacterial protein (not live bacteria) into the air, creating ice crystals and, subsequently, clouds and rain. As Henderson-Begg explains it, “Clouds high in the atmosphere trap solar radiation, warming the planet. Low clouds reflect solar heat, keeping the planet cool. If we could modify clouds, we could prevent global warming.”

The next day, I head out with University of Sheffield plant ecologist Gareth Phoenix to collect moss campion. We hike across a delta created by glacial runoff, hopping from stone to stone in a futile attempt not to dunk our feet, until we reach a spot where the wildflower grows. The moss campion and other plants, like the polar willow, which reaches a grand height of three centimetres, will shed light on how the Arctic copes with pollution carried here from Europe. On our way back, a chubby Svalbard reindeer jogging across the moraine makes me think about the potential of the sci-fi ice bugs. It’s almost as if Phoenix had read my mind. “Svalbard is so spectacular, it makes you feel really insignificant as a human being and even more desperate to protect such a place,” he tells me. “Planet Earth has only one Arctic. It would be nice to keep it as it is.”

An Arctic Kingdom Expedition to Svalbard

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Seals are among the species threatened by warming oceans

One of the things I get asked most often when I tell people about writing for Arctic Kingdom is, “Is there any truth to this ‘Global Warming’ thing?”

I like to see it as a sort of touching optimism. The news I read every day contains more and more bad news about melting glaciers, endangered animals, and changing weather patterns all over the world. The arctic we see on our expeditions is changing, with warmer summers, less ice, and rising sea temperatures. It would be nice if it were all a matter of opinion, but the evidence seems clear: the world’s climate is being transformed.

And the scientific community agrees. In a recent issue of the Journal Science, scientists around the globe reviewed evidence from the International Polar Year, concluding that climate change threatens species throughout the Arctic.

“It seems no matter where you look — on the ground, in the air, or in the water — we’re seeing signs of rapid change,” said biologist Eric Post of Penn State University.

The report says that a warming of 1.8 degrees Fahrenheit over the past 150 years has already caused dramatic consequences.

It cautions that further changes resulting from the projected six-degree warming over the next century will be difficult to predict.

Ivory gulls, ringed seals, polar bears and narwhals are examples of species with a small distribution and specialized habitats, leaving them vulnerable to being the first species to suffer from climate change.

via Earth Week:New Arctic Emerging From Climate Change.

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Over at Arctic Portal, I ran across a news item about Iceland’s Marine Research Institute’s research on whale migration patterns through Icelandic waters. They’ve tagged Minke Whales, Humpback Whales, and finally, this past June, a Blue Whale. Arctic Portal writes,

This is a first time that the migration pattern of a Blue whale has been tracked and thus very important and interesting information for both the public and the research community. The Blue Whale was marked in Skjálfandi bay in northern Iceland in June 23 and has since travelled almost 8000km from north-coast of Iceland to the southeast coast, visiting west-coast Greenland on its way.

The travelling pattern of the Blue Whale is characterized by rapid sprints, while it can dwell in restricted areas for several days, most likely for food gathering.

The migration of Blue Whales to the south is soon getting started and the research institution hopes that the senders will continue to send signals through that period giving them thus valuable information on the migration pattern itself and a hint of their hibernation.

This is exciting news for researchers, but even armchair Blue Whale enthusiasts can follow the whale’s progress via Google maps. Check it out!

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Yesterday’s Morning Edition on NPR featured another story on Dr. Kristin Laidre’s research on Narwhals. This story focused on the techniques she’s using to tag the whales, and the Inuit hunters who are using traditional hunting methods to make Dr. Laidre’s research possible. Listen in or read a transcript over on the Morning Edition website.

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Loyal readers of this blog may remember Kristin Laidre, the ballet-dancer-turned-oceanographer whose research on narwhals kicked off our Narwhal Week this past June.

So it was a bit like running into an old friend when I turned on NPR’s morning edition yesterday to hear a field report on Dr. Laidre’s research.

The piece really brings home the difficulties inherent in studying narwhals, from the harsh conditions at the top of the world to the slippery nature of the creatures themselves. Visit NPR’s website to listen to the feature or read a written version of the piece. And blog readers in the States should be sure to listen to today’s Morning Edition for a follow up piece on the Inuit hunters assisting Dr. Laidre with her research. That piece should also be available online any time after 9:00 AM EST today.

Does all this talk of narwhals have you itching for an Arctic expedition of your own? Check out our trips page for more information on expeditions across the hemisphere!

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Over on the Discovery Channel’s Earth Live Blog, Dr. George Divoky, a participant in International Polar Year’s Polar-Palooza outreach program and a scientist who has been studying Cooper Island’s Black Guillemot population for more than 30 years, describes some of the changes he’s seeing in the Arctic:

When presenting to school groups one of my tasks is to ask ”what is wrong with this picture?” as a PhotoShopped image of a polar bear walking behind some penguins appears on the screen. This summer, though not as incredible as the penguin/polar bear pairing, I find myself looking at the images obtained over the past month on Cooper Island and thinking “what is wrong with these pictures?” But I know that the images of polar bears walking around the colony, sleeping on the beach and approaching the campsite, things I could never have imagined before 2002,are the product of habitat degradation rather than any image manipulation.

When Dr. Divoky talks about polar bears “approaching the campsite, he isn’t kidding! The video below was taken by his camps’ motion-sensitive cameras at 3:30 AM.

Dr Divoky set up alarms to alert him to bears’ presence after bedtime, but that hasn’t prevented bears from doing damage to Black Guillemot nests and snacking on fledgelings. Sadly, these sorts of changes in animal behaviour are one of many everyday impacts of global warming already in evidence in today’s Arctic.

via Is It a Bird or a Bear? – Earth Live: Cooper Island.

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New Scientist Video: Researcher Alun Hubbard discusses the break up of the ice

The biggest glacier in the Arctic is on the verge of losing a chunk of ice the size of Manhattan. A group of scientists and climate change activists who are closely monitoring the Petermann glacier’s ice tongue believe the rapid flow of ice is in part due to warm ocean currents moving up along the coast of Greenland, fuelled by global warming.

Via New Scientist

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A Polar Bear checks out an expedition boat in Lyon Inlet

Below the Waterline an Iceberg Is Mostly Bear

Boy #1: Polar bears don’t melt in water!

Boy #2: Yeah, they do. They swim in it and they disappear.

Boy #1: Wow, really?

via Overheard in New York | Below the Waterline an Iceberg Is Mostly Bear.

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