Everyone knows that the bulk of an iceberg is underwater, so what happens when they hit the sea floor? Icebergs that scrape over the sea floor or get stuck on underwater elevations cause enormous disturbance events. Entire faunal assemblages are wiped out during such events. Scraping icebergs leave behind a diverse landscape, usually marked by “bulldozed” areas as well as ploughed sediments or piles of rock. This new, unoccupied habitat is quickly seized by mobile pioneer species. Often, patchworks of different recolonization stages form and thus enhance species diversity. Initially, scientists assumed that the seafloor fauna of the Larsen A and B area would have been strongly affected by iceberg scouring. When an ice shelf collapses, many smaller icebergs form in a shor...

Under the former Larsen ice shelf east of the Antarctic Peninsula, deep-sea sea cucumbers and stalked feather stars were ubiquitously found in shallow waters. These animals usually inhabit far greater water depths. The main aim of the current Polarstern expedition to Antarctica is the investigation of marine ecosystems under the former Larsen ice shelf. This "white spot" with regard to biodiversity research gave rise to the following questions: What kind of life actually existed under the former floating ice shelf which was up to several hundred meters thick? What are the prospects for the future after the collapse of the ice shelf? Obviously, prosperous life did not exist in the area where the Larsen B ice shelf broke off three years ago. This is surprisin...

You can track the Polarstern research vessel in a number of ways as it traverses Antarctic waters. You can view the raw coordinate data here on www.sailwx.info's tracking map. You can also track it in Google Earth by downloading this constantly updated file from the SCAR MarBIN portal. The file in turn accesses position data from this page on the Polar View website, which al...

ATTENTION: News, Education Editors CONTACT: Tom Simons, University Communications, (402) 472-8514 This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it ) Lincoln, Neb., Dec. 19, 2006 -- The Antarctic Geological Drilling (ANDRILL) Program drilled to a new record depth of 1,000 meters below the seafloor from the site on the Ross Ice Shelf near Scott Base in Antarctica Dec. 16. The depth made ANDRILL the most successful Antarctic drilling program in terms of depth and rock core recovered, breaking the previous record of 999.1 meters set in 2000 by the Ocean Drilling Program's drill ship, the Joides Resolution. The operations team of 25 drillers, engineers and support staff are justifiably thrilled, ANDRILL Project Manager Jim Cowie said. Antarctica New Ze...

Because they are so many birds and so few observers around Antarctica, every observation matters. The recently launched marine biodiversity internet portal SCAR-MarBIN allows birdwatchers to directly upload their data, making them available to scientists as well as the general public. As top predators, birds are an important component of the Southern Ocean‘s ecosystem. They are part of the comprehensive effort of the Census of Antarctic Marine Life (CAML) to study the distribution and abundance of the Antarctic biodiversity. CAML is now using the SCAR MarBIN portal, developed at the Royal Belgian Institute for Natural Sciences by Claude De Broyer and Bruno Danis, to concentrate biogeographical data on bi...

ANDRILLs ARISE Program is seeking educators with a broad background in science activities and professional involvement indicating excellence in science education. All applicants must have at least 3 years science teaching experience in a K-16 school or institution, not including the current school year. ARISE (Antarctic Research Immersion for Science Educators) is a component of the ANtarctic geological DRILLing (ANDRILL) Program, which seeks to understand the geologic history of Antarctica through the study of core samples and data recovered from drilling below the seafloor at sites beneath the ice shelf and sea ice. The ARISE goal is to raise public awareness of Antarctic scientific drilling and integrate polar geosciences content into a wide range of learning environme...

Thousands of amphipods can reduce fish carcasses to bones, but these carrion experts are unexpectedly scarce in the area of the recently collapsed Larsen B ice shelf, where the Polarstern Expedition is currently conducting research Baited traps consistently used to provide good numbers of amphipods throughout the expedition, whether designed to catch them or targeting fish. “Traps are secured on a metal frame, equipped with a weight and buoys designed to cope with the high pressure at the sea floor, and then dropped to the bottom. After 48 hours, the vessel returns, triggering the traps' release from the weights via an acoustic signal sent from a transmitter. Within 15 to 30 minutes, depending on the water depth, the traps float to the surface and are recovered,” explai...

Remotely Operated Vehicles (ROVs) remain an efficient technology to uncover the secrets of Antarctic sea floor fauna. A video sequence at the foot of the Larsen B ice-shelf remnant reveals deep-sea sea cucumbers as abundant inhabitants. ROVs have become standard non-invasive imaging tools for the Alfred Wegener Institute’s biological expeditions. For our expedition, devoted to the study of continental shelf sea floor communities (which were once under the now collapsed Larsen B ice-shelf), the ROV model Cherokee was selected (shown in the photo). “Inspection ROVs like the Cherokee are fast to deploy and easy to recover” explains the marine ecologist Julian Gutt, who has 15 years ROV experience in Antarctic sea floor fauna investigation. Already used on a...

Climate change-induced increase of carbon dioxide, according to modelling approaches, is going to cause the acidification of the world’s oceans. By the year 2100 the current pH might drop by 0.5. Our research is focusing on the question ‘how do fish respond to such changes?’ At the department "Marine Animal Physiology" of the Alfred Wegener Institute, researchers developed a device that enables onboard measurements of the impact of decreased pH values on the gill functioning of freshly caught fish (see overview photograph). In order to simulate blood circulation, specially prepared gill tissue is constantly flushed with a saline solution. Special devices allow measurements to be taken of gill performance in plain and acidified seawater for more than 6 hours (see det...

Education and Outreach is playing an ever increasing role in the world of science. This is also true for our expedition especially with regard to the upcoming International Polar Year. Scientists, which rely on funding from the government, fulfil their obligation towards the general public and funding bodies by communicating their results in an easy and comprehensible manner. More and more scientific organisations such as the "Census of Marine Life" encourage liaisons between art and science. Unfortunately due to great scientific interest it was not possible to give an artist the opportunity to join the expedition. But an unexpected awakening of creativity, imagination, and artistic talent occurred onboard the “Polarstern”. Indeed these are skills that are also of high relevance to a...