February 20, 2009 The multinational ANDRILL (ANtarctic geological DRILLing) program, involving scientists, engineers, students, and educators from Germany, Italy, New Zealand, and the United States, has contributed exciting scientific results during the International Polar Year (IPY). In addition to the science outcomes there has been a focused effort to expand education and public outreach activities. These activities have engaged teachers, students and the general public. ANDRILL successfully implemented two scientific drilling expeditions during the IPY, one in the austral spring and summer of 2006 and one in the austral summer of 2007. These expeditions recovered long sediment and rock cores that preserve the geologic and paleoclimatic record of Antarctica from the ...

Polar Bears and Penguins May Live at Opposite Poles, But Census of Marine Life Explorers Find Hundreds of Identical Species Thrive in Both Arctic and Antarctic Contacts: Mr. Terry Collins, +1-416-878-8712; +1-416-538-8712; terrycollins@rogers.com Ms. Darlene Trew Crist, +1-401-295-1356; +1-401-952-7692; darlene.crist@cox.net Mr. Gregg Schmidt, +1-202- 448-1231; gschmidt@oceanleadership.org Experts are available for advance interviews. Video and high-resolution images are online at www.coml.org/embargo/polar2009 Download PDF of CoML IPY Press Release for i...

EBA is a complex interdisciplinary project involving over 40 research groups from approximately 22 nations, as well as links to the Arctic research community. Its work crosses traditional disciplinary divides within biology, in particular working across the marine and terrestrial realms. EBA has multiple aims reflected in its structure of 5 work packages. At a broad scale, these packages are aimed at understanding how the various ecosystems of Antarctica are structured and function, what historical processes have shaped them to be as they are now, what evolutionary processes have taken place in the Antarctic environment and, in turn, what that tells us about the environment itself. Finally, in the context of parts of Antarctica currently facing the fastest rates of environmental change on ...

(c) National Science Foundation After years of planning, strategizing, and international discussions and debate, what once seemed to be only lofty scientific ambitions are now closer than ever to becoming a reality. Ever since subglacial lakes captured the imagination of scientists and the public more than a decade ago, researchers have dreamed of entering and sampling these alien environments to unlock secrets that might guide us in the search for life elsewhere in our solar system. The Scientific Committee on Antarctic Research’s (SCAR) Scientific Research Program (SRP) on Subglacial Antarctic Lake Envir...

Overview The IPY sea ice workshop will bring together participants of the SIPEX and SIMBA cruises conducted in the Antarctic in spring 2007, as well as others interested in Antarctic sea ice processes, modelling and remote sensing.  Ground-truthing of remote sensing will be a major emphasis as specific RADARSAT and ICESat missions coincided with the cruises, as well as an archival campaign for Envisat ASAR imagery.  There are currently 35 confirmed attendees. The schedule will allow for parallel breakout sessions to facilitate discussion on topics of interest to workshop participants, and the plenary session on the first day will afford all participants an opportunity to propose discussion topics. One outcome of the workshop will be a final list of papers for the ...

An Italian Teacher's experience in Antarctica, by Graziano Scotto di Clemente. Italian Translation I am an Italian Science teacher. I am working in a lower secondary school (11-14 year old pupils), for the past 30 years, in Treviso, a town near Venice (North Italy). I am interested in science education, science history, and environmental activities.

Dai Ghiacci allo Spazio — The history of the Navy Officer Carl Weyprecht and of the development of his international scientific research project in the political and cultural context of the 19th century, and up to the present IPY, IGY, IYPE, eGY and IHY. Published in Italian by Biblion Edizioni in 2008. The First International Polar Year was born from an idea of the Austro-Hungarian Naval lieutenant, Carl Weyprecht. Coming back to Trieste, Italy, from his expedition in the Arctics, Weyprecht developed his plan ...

Under the auspices of the SCAR project Antarctic Sea Ice Processes and Climate (ASPeCt) and the Antarctic Sea Ice in IPY project for International Polar Year, we are holding a workshop on 22-24 March 2009 in Il Ciocco, Lucca, Italy. The main purpose of the workshop is to review and establish joint data analyses from two late-winter cruises to the Antarctic Sea Ice Zone both made during Sept-Oct 2007. An extensive satellite remote sensing campaign with designated IceSAT altimetry, RadarSAT images, and EnviSAT ASAR images coincided with the surface measurements. SIMBA (Sea Ice Mass Balance in the Antarctic) activities along 90W longitude in the Bellingshausen Sea are summarized here, while SIPEX (Sea Ice Physics and Ecosystem...

On occasion of the IV International Polar Year, Italian researchers of the Project “Map of Arctic People set up a touring historical-photographical exhibition focused on polar regions, called The Lords of Tundra, in order to spread the knowledge over arctic populations and lands. Protagonists of the lens are the Ural Mountains chain, the Arctic ocean being objects of significant transformations produced by the recent climate changes - and, above all, Nenets (or Nency) population, inhabiting the ice of Jamal Peninsula, in Siberia. Nency people are nomadic breeders founding their existence on reindeer breeding, thus constituting one of the last...

“Friends from the World is an intercultural exchange project conceived, within the project Map of Arctic People, aimed at promoting the reciprocal knowledge among children belonging to different cultures. The project was originally dreamt up as a bridge between the arctic world and the rest. Over the years, also thanks to the collaboration of the Italian nonprofit association Perigeo Onlus, engaged in the safeguard and valorisation of indigenous peoples cultural heritage, it succeeded in involving children belongin...