Over the past 200 years, our planet’s oceans have absorbed more than a quarter of all anthropogenic carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. As a result, their acidity has increased by nearly 30 percent their [...] recently demonstrated. If this comes to pass, it could have far-reaching consequences for life in the ocean, as they report in the journal Nature.

the Alfred Wegener Institute’s flagship has successfully completed more than 130 expeditions to the Arctic and Antarctic and offered a temporary home for thousands of researchers from Germany and around the [...] safely traversed 1.8 million nautical miles. The ship is currently on an expedition in the Southern Ocean.

We know little about the fish stocks in the central Arctic Ocean, and what we know about the local ecosystem is insufficient to ensure sustainable management. In response, in June 2021 the Agreement to [...] to Prevent Unregulated High Seas Fisheries in the Central Arctic Ocean – which includes a moratorium on fishing in the region – entered into force. The European Union and nine other countries signed the

million metric tons of CO 2 in the Arctic deep sea for millennia. In this region alone, a previously unknown transport route uses the biological carbon pump and ocean currents to absorb atmospheric CO 2

A major new project will help benchmark biodiversity change in the Arctic Ocean and guide conservation efforts by identifying unique species and assessing their extinction risk. The research led by scientists

north of Svalbard, as well as ocean/glacier interactions off the coast of Greenland. Central research questions included how the ice conditions, ocean heat fluxes and ocean stratification determine sea-ice [...] The Research Vessel Polarstern was in the Arctic for the past seven weeks. There, the summertime sea-ice extent declined by ca. 40 percent over the past 40 years – making it one of the most visible impacts

Today, the research vessel Polarstern will depart on a seven-week-long voyage to the Arctic, where the onset of summer also marks the beginning of the annual sea-ice melting. Over the past 40 years, the [...] zone, the team of researchers on board will investigate how heat fluxes and water layering in the ocean, as well as the characteristics of the ice, interact and influence melting. A further focus of the

, e.g. in water bodies, the soil and the air. Via ocean currents and rivers, the tiny plastic particles can even reach the Arctic, Antarctic or ocean depths. A new overview study has now shown that wind [...] the Institute for Advanced Sustainability Studies in Potsdam, and the GEOMAR Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research in Kiel – describes how microplastic finds its way into the atmosphere and how it is subsequently

of plastic has reached all spheres of the Arctic: large quantities of plastic - transported by rivers, the air and shipping- can now be found in the Arctic Ocean. High concentrations of microplastic can

in the middle of the Arctic Ocean. The results from Stockholm University, the Alfred Wegener Institute and colleagues in the European Fisheries Inventory in the Central Arctic Ocean (EFICA) Consortium are