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The Arctic Ocean was once a gigantic freshwater lake. Only after the land bridge between Greenland and Scotland had submerged far enough did vast quantities of salt water pour in from the Atlantic. With the help of a climate model, researchers from the Alfred Wegener Institute have demonstrated how this process took place, allowing us for the first time to understand more accurately how Atlantic circulation as we know it today came about. The results of the study have now been published in the journal Nature Communications.

It is only six centimetres long, but it plays a major role in the Antarctic ecosystem: the small crustacean Euphausia superba (Antarctic krill). It's one of the world's most abundant species and the central diet of a number of animals in the Southern Ocean. For a long time, scientists have been puzzled why the size of krill stocks fluctuates so widely. In a new study headed by Prof. Bernd Blasius and Prof. Bettina Meyer, a group of scientists from the University of Oldenburg's Institute for Chemistry and Biology of the Marine Environment (ICBM) and the…

During the last glacial period – when the ice in the Antarctic was far thicker and extended further offshore than it does today – it has been speculated that subglacial lakes existed beneath it. An international team of researchers has now successfully sampled the metre-thick sediment layers left behind by these lakes contemporary on the seafloor. This is the outcome of a study by Gerhard Kuhn and colleagues, which was published today in the journal Nature Communications.

The habitability of our planet is closely linked to the diversity of its flora and fauna – and not just on land, but also in the water. How and why is marine biodiversity responding to global change? How are these changes affecting marine ecosystems and their functions? And how can society adapt to or mitigate them? From now on, researchers will focus on these questions at the Helmholtz Institute for Functional Marine Biodiversity (HIFMB), which was officially inaugurated today at the University of Oldenburg – a step that will allow the University and…

The Chinese Arctic and Antarctic Administration (CAA) and the Alfred Wegener Institute Helmholtz Centre for Polar and Marine Research (AWI) signed a Memorandum of Understanding on their future cooperation.

On Wednesday, 24 May 2017, 49 atmospheric and cloud researchers, sea-ice physicists, marine biologists and biogeochemists will embark on a joint expedition headed for Svalbard. On board the research vessel Polarstern from the Alfred Wegener Institute, Helmholtz Centre for Polar and Marine Research (AWI) all of these disciplines are focused on just one question: How is the climate changing the Arctic? At the same time, the AWI research aircraft Polar 5 and Polar 6, launching from Longyearbyen (Svalbard), will engage in atmospheric measurement flights.

Today, the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) and the Alfred Wegener Institute, Helmholtz Centre for Polar and Marine Research (AWI) officially announced the start of the international research initiative Year of Polar Prediction. The goal of the two-year project, which involves partners from more than 20 countries, is to comprehensively improve weather, ice and climate predictions for the Arctic and Antarctic, so as to achieve two major milestones: more reliable risk assessments for shipping and other human activities, which will help to avoid…

125 years ago, the Royal Biological Institute (Königliche Biologische Anstalt) was founded on Helgoland – and oceanography has been a fixture on the island ever since. It would later become the Biological Institute Helgoland (Biologische Anstalt Helgoland / BAH), which joined the Alfred Wegener Institute in 1998. Generations of scientists have conducted research on the ecology of coastal and shelf-sea systems – on Helgoland and, since 1924, at the BAH’s facilities in List on Sylt. Combining a proud tradition and forward-thinking orientation, the work…

By the second half of this century, rising air temperatures above the Weddell Sea could set off a self-amplifying meltwater feedback cycle under the Filchner-Ronne Ice Shelf, ultimately causing the second-largest ice shelf in the Antarctic to shrink dramatically. Climate researchers at the Alfred Wegener Institute, Helmholtz Centre for Polar and Marine Research (AWI) recently made this prediction in a new study, which can be found in the latest issue of the Journal of Climate, released today. In the study, the researchers use an ice-ocean model created…

On Saturday, 22 April 2017, there will be a worldwide “March for Science”: in more than 300 cities, people will take to the streets, demonstrating for the freedom of science and research. The Alfred Wegener Institute, Helmholtz Centre for Polar and Marine Research (AWI) welcomes this initiative, which it is raising awareness for with posters at several locations. Institute staff will send messages of support to those participating in the “March for Science”  – from the Open Ship Polarstern event in Bremerhaven, from on board the research ship Heincke,…