Europe: Bernhard Diekmann Find out more > Dialogue & Lectures Lectures | 15.07.2018 Arctic Environments in Change Ecologic Arctic Summer College Policy advice [...] glance back in time shows: the face of our planet was not only dictated by the coming and going of oceans and mountains, or the wandering of continents; it was also constantly shaped by natural climate change [...] live in a world characterised by perpetual ice in the Antarctic, and fluctuating ice extents in the Arctic, North America and Europe. The North German landscape is a legacy of the last glacial 20,000 years

you have a window into ocean temperature at a moment in the past. Another example is the isotopic composition of boron, which reflects the pH of ancient seawater – a measure of ocean acidity that is closely [...] process by which warmer, saltier water masses from the Atlantic are pushing further north into the Arctic Ocean through the Fram Strait. This is a recent and ongoing phenomenon, and understanding its pace and [...] reconstruct those past episodes – how fast things changed, what forces drove them, how ice sheets and oceans responded – we would gain something invaluable: a longer perspective on what is possible. But how

Tallinna Tehnikaülikool (Estonia) Gronlands Naturinstitut (Greenland) Arctic Monitoring and Assessment Programme Secretariat World Ocean Council EU-PolarNet Participants (Photo: Alfred Wegener Institut)

the vast exchange of water between the deep ocean and the sea surface that is unprecedented in the global ocean elsewhere. Over past decades, the Southern Ocean has substantially slowed global surface warming [...] Journal of Geophysical Research: Oceans, 130, e2025JC022530. doi.org/10.1029/2025JC022530 Olivier, L. , Haumann, F. A. (2025). Southern Ocean freshening stalls deep ocean CO 2 release in a changing climate [...] Postdoc My aim is to better understand the ocean carbon sink and its changes, with a special focus on the Southern Ocean. I study how the physics of the ocean impact the return pathways of CO 2 to the surface

Main REcoM references: Schourup-Kristensen, V., Wekerle, C., Wolf-Gladrow, D., Völker, C. (2018): Arctic Ocean biogeochemistry in the high resolution FESOM 1.4-REcoM2 model, Progress in Oceanography, 168, [...] (2014). A skill assessment of the biogeochemical model REcoM2 coupled to the Finite Element Sea Ice-Ocean Model (FESOM 1.3), Geoscientific Model Development, 7 (6), 2769-2802. doi:10.5194/gmd-7-2769-2014 [...] Losch, M. and Wolf-Gladrow, D.A. (2013). Seasonally different carbon flux changes in the Southern Ocean in response to the southern annular mode, Global Biogeochemical Cycles, 27 (4), 1236-1245. doi:10

Assessing the contribution of ocean and sea ice initialization for seasonal predictionin the Arctic , Madlen Kimmritz Assimilation of sea ice freeboard observations into an ocean and ice analysis and forecast [...] zone from ocean gravity wave attenuation, Giacomo De Carolis Sea Ice Concentration uncertainties , Rasmus Tonboe Sea-ice thickness and snow depth observations from satellite altimeters in Arctic and Antarctica [...] and results) Sea ice observations and uncertainties Sea ice model parameterizations and coupling to ocean and atmosphere models Verification approaches for sea ice analyses and forecasts Automated prediction

degrees Celsius. The polar 6 research aircraft of the Alfred Wegener Institute flies over the Arctic Ocean during an IceBird sea ice thickness campagne. (Photo: Esther Horvath) AWI researchers use the [...] the Earth’s crust, ice- and snow-covered areas, oceans and the atmosphere. Several times a year, Polar 5 and Polar 6 fly weeks-long expeditions in the Arctic and Antarctic. They carry on board a diverse range [...] Alfred Wegener Institute’s research is conducted in the inaccessible, ice-covered regions of the Arctic and Antarctic, making research aircraft indispensable. Currently the AWI relies on the research planes

Tromsö Chief Scientist: R. Stein Cruise report Programme Weekly reports Data PS87 | ARK-XXVIII/4 | Arctic Ocean, Central Basin Start: 2014-08-05, Tromsö End: 2014-10-08, Bremerhaven Chief Scientist: R. Stein [...] Chief Scientist: R. Gersonde Cruise report Programme Weekly reports Data PS72 | ARK-XXIII/3 | Arctic Ocean Start: 2008-08-12, Reykjavik End: 2008-10-17, Bremerhaven Chief Scientist: W. Jokat Cruise report

Molecular Sea Ice Ecology Polar oceans are seasonally covered by sea ice with an average size of the continent of North America. Despite harsh conditions therein, sea ice and its lower surface can carry [...] community, typically dominated by Diatoms. Sea ice can provide important primary production to polar oceans via these communities, although they are often very patchy. In times of declining sea ice coverage [...] biodiversity, functions provided by its biota, and the future of sea ice communities in a warming ocean. We address these questions through analyses of total communities, their molecular biodiversity and

based on blue-green algae … Find out more The pulse of the Arctic The ‘Arctic PASSION’ project provides environmental data from the Arctic for the local population, for science and for local politics [...] Using Knowledge to Combat Plastic Litter Plastic has reached even the most remote corners of the ocean. The AWI is not only investigating the scale and impacts of the problem; it's also contributing the [...] politics Find out more Putting permafrost in the classroom The Arctic’s frozen soils are thawing – with consequences for climate and humans. Together with partner schools in Germany, schoolchildren from Aklavik