News

Vast seasonal differences in climate history challenge modellers
The severe climate oscillations in the North Atlantic area during the last glacial period were a phenomenon of extreme winters - the summers were only slightly affected. This is the result of the examinations of research teams from the Netherlands, the Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine Research in the Helmholtz Association, Bremerhaven, and the Leibniz Institute of Marine Sciences, Kiel. It has now been published in the periodical “Nature Geoscience”.

The German Research Vessel Polarstern had to prove its ice breaking capabilities in Arctic waters to gain data on two series of long-term research measurements. After working in regions up to latitude 82° N, Polarstern of the Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine Research in the Helmholtz Association will enter port in Reykjavik (Iceland) on August 10th.

The head of the Research Unit Potsdam of the Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine Research in the Helmholtz Association, Prof. Dr. Hans-Wolfgang Hubberten, is the new president of the International Permafrost Association IPA. His appointment took place at the 9th International Conference on Permafrost in Fairbanks, Alaska. Prof. Hubberten will lead the International Permafrost Association for the next four years. During his term in office he will coordinate, among other things, the analysis of the scientific results of the International Polar…

After completing their simulation component in the German-Indonesian Tsunami Early Warning System (GITEWS), the team for tsunami modelling of the Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine Research in the Helmholtz Association has presented the currently leading software system for tsunami events with the potential for catastrophe.

The ice cover in the Arctic Ocean at the end of summer 2008 will lie, with almost 100 per cent probability, below that of the year 2005 – the year with the second lowest sea ice extent ever measured. Chances of an equally low value as in the extreme conditions of the year 2007 lie around eight per cent. Climate scientists from the Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine Research in the Helmholtz Association come to this conclusion in a recent model calculation.

The international archive for radiation data, the World Radiation Monitoring Center (WRMC), provides climate research with high-precision meteorological series of measurements. After a term of fifteen years at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Zurich (ETHZ), the Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine Research in the Helmholtz Association ensures the successful continuity and enhancements of this unique archive.

For the first time an international team of scientists was able to provide evidence of explosive volcanism in the deeps of the ice-covered Arctic Ocean. Researchers from an expedition to the Gakkel Ridge report in the current issue of the journal Nature that they discovered extensive layers of volcanic ash on the seafloor, indicating a gigantic volcanic eruption.

The Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine Research in the Helmholtz Association (AWI) and the Center for Marine Environmental Sciences (MARUM) received the 21st Century Achievement Award of the Computerworld Honors Program in the category Environment, which is one of the most prestigious awards in information technology.

Research ice breaker Polarstern of the Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine Research of the Helmholtz Association puts out to the Arctic on June 12th after three weeks in the dockyards. The expedition of four months length is divided into three stages and leads via the Greenland Sea to Spitsbergen and up to the Fram Strait. The journey through the Northwest Passage up to the East Siberian Sea is planned as the third stage. Two days earlier, on June 10th, the research vessel Heincke leaves the island of Helgoland towards the Orkney Islands.…

The European Project on Ocean Acidification (EPOCA) will be launched on 10 June 2008. Its goal is to document ocean acidification, investigate its impact on biological processes, predict its consequences over the next 100 years, and advise policy-makers on potential thresholds or tipping points that should not be exceeded.