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Extreme sea surface temperatures in 2023 resulted in high CO₂ outgassing, particularly in the North Atlantic, meaning that the global ocean absorbed less CO₂ overall. Thanks to El Niño, much less CO₂ than usual escaped into the atmosphere in the eastern Pacific, but the outgassing in the North Atlantic negated the positive effect. The fact that the ocean did not lose even more CO₂ is due to physical and biological processes that limited outgassing in spite of the record-high temperatures. It is uncertain, however, as to whether these compensating…

What are the global impacts of an ice-free Arctic? How will the Arctic develop with increasing climate warming? What does an ice-free Arctic mean for our environment and our society? These are the key questions that the “i2B - Into The Blue” project addresses.

Representatives from over 170 countries as well as from science, civil society and industry are meeting in Switzerland From 5 to 14 August, continuing the negotiations for a legally binding agreement to tackle the global plastic pollution.

A new study, led by the Lancaster University and involving the Alfred Wegener Institute, reveals how, under extreme conditions, melt water flooding underneath the ice can force its way upwards through the ice and escape at the ice sheet surface. Researchers observed this phenomenon for the first time in Greenland and described it in detail in the journal Nature Geoscience. It sheds new light on the destructive potential of meltwater stored beneath the ice sheet.

Waves, as we see them on the beach or at sea, are so-called gravity waves. They are created because the Earth's gravity pulls the water downwards. In addition to these waves that we see on the surface, there are also waves that form inside the ocean. They can grow as large as skyscrapers, travel thousands of kilometres and have a major impact on the transport of heat and nutrients. When they break, the surrounding ocean water is mixed. Oceanographer Dr Friederike Pollmann and her new Junior Researcher Group Artemics (Arctic internal wave energetics and…

Continuous, high-precision temperature measurements under the extreme conditions of the polar regions are the aim of a new borehole measurement system, now funded by the European Union as an ERC Proof of Concept Grant with 150,000 euros for 1.5 years.

For years, scientists have debated whether a massive, kilometre-thick ice shelf once covered the entire Arctic Ocean during the coldest phases of the Ice Ages. A new study, now published in Science Advances, questions this idea. The research team found no evidence of such a permanent, pan-Arctic ice shelf. Instead, the Arctic Ocean appears to have been covered by seasonal sea ice, allowing open water—and life—to persist even during the harshest glacial periods of the past 750,000 years. This discovery sheds new light on how the Arctic has responded to…

One of the most current topics in climate research is the impact of extreme events such as heat waves or cold spells on biological communities in ecosystems. The consequences of climate change can be seen particularly clearly in the Arctic, as the region is warming faster than the rest of the world. It therefore offers scientists a unique opportunity to better understand processes and relationships between environmental factors such as temperature, soil or nutrients and biological communities. In a recent study published in the journal Scientific…

The global ocean takes up about a quarter of all CO2 that humans emit into the atmosphere. The Southern Ocean is responsible for about 40% of this. However, the amount of CO2 it can uptake varies from year to year. An international research team with the participation of the Alfred Wegener Institute investigated why the uptake varies so much and was able to show that what happens in winter is crucial in explaining this variability in CO2 uptake. The study was published in the journal Communications Earth & Environment. 

During the end of the last ice age huge amounts of CO2 which were formerly stored in the deep ocean upwelled in the Southern Ocean and were released to the atmosphere. This was one of the main causes of global warming at that time. However, it is assumed that not all of the stored carbon was released into the atmosphere, but that parts were directly transported northwards by the so-called Antarctic Intermediate and Mode Water into the East Pacific. So far, however, this has not been clearly proven. Using a combination of sediment core analyses and highly…