Latest Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine Research Stories

  You can’t get any “higher”: on 22 August 2011 at exactly 9.42 a.m. the research icebreaker Polarstern of the Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine Research in the Helmholtz Association reaches the North Pole. The aim of the current expedition is to document changes in the far north. Thus, the researchers on board are conducting an extensive investigation program in the water, ice and air at the northernmost point on the Earth. The little sea ice cover makes the route via...

Investigations of changes in Weddell Sea habitatThe research vessel Polarstern of the Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine Research in the Helmholtz Association will arrive back at its homeport of Bremerhaven after a seven-month expedition on Friday, 20 May. Nearly 200 researchers from institutes in 15 countries took part in the expedition. The oceanographers on board conducted measurements showing that warming of the water in the deep Weddell Sea continues further. The observations...

The research aircraft Polar 5 of the Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine Research in the Helmholtz Association returned to Bremerhaven from a six-week expedition in the high Arctic on May 6. Joint flights with aircraft of the European and American space agencies (ESA and NASA) were a novelty in sea ice research. Simultaneous measurements with a large number of sensors on three planes underneath the CryoSat-2 satellite led to unique data records. Furthermore, the international team...

International studies describe current state of the Arctic coastsThe coastline in Arctic regions reacts to climate change with increased erosion and retreats by half a meter per year on average. This means substantial changes for Arctic ecosystems near the coast and the population living there. A consortium of more than thirty scientists from ten countries, including researchers from the Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine Research in the Helmholtz Association and from the Helmholtz...

The freshwater content of the upper Arctic Ocean has increased by about 20 percent since the 1990s. This corresponds to a rise of approx. 8,400 cubic kilometers and has the same magnitude as the volume of freshwater annually exported on average from this marine region in liquid or frozen form. This result  is published by researchers of the Alfred Wegener Institute in the journal Deep-Sea Research. The freshwater content in the layer of the Arctic Ocean near the surface controls whether...

Arctic-wide measurements verify rapid depletion in recent daysUnusually low temperatures in the Arctic ozone layer have recently initiated massive ozone depletion. The Arctic appears to be heading for a record loss of this trace gas that protects the Earth's surface against ultraviolet radiation from the sun. This result has been found by measurements carried out by an international network of over 30 ozone sounding stations spread all over the Arctic and Subarctic and coordinated by the...

The extent of the sea ice in the Arctic will reach its annual minimum in September. Forecasts indicate that it will not be as low as in 2007, the year of the smallest area covered by sea ice since satellites started recording such data. Nevertheless, sea ice physicists at the Alfred Wegener Institute are concerned about the long-term equilibrium in the Arctic Ocean. They have indications that the mass of sea ice is dwindling because its thickness is declining. To substantiate this, they are...

Autonomous underwater vehicle of the Alfred Wegener Institute dives under the Arctic ice for the first timeThe Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine Research in the Helmholtz Association for the first time sent its Autonomous Underwater Vehicle (AUV) on an under-ice mission at about 79° North. The four-metre-long, torpedo shaped underwater vehicle was deployed from the research icebreaker Polarstern under heavy pack ice. The vehicle was subsequently recovered by helicopter."We...

Researchers from German Alfred Wegener Institute and KlimaCampus present forecasts on September minimumA critical minimum for Arctic sea ice can also be expected for late summer 2010. Scientists from the German "Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine Research in the Helmholtz Association (AWI)" in Bremerhaven and from "KlimaCampus" of the University of Hamburg have now published their projections in the current Sea Ice Outlook. The online publication compares the...

Scientists from the Alfred Wegener Institute present first results of a new measurement method in AntarcticaCurrently 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...