the following paragraphs, the team from the first leg of the journey, which was dominated by thin sea ice, review the mission so far: despite extremely challenging conditions, they maintained a steady

floe: the sea ice in which the research vessel Polarstern is now drifting through the Arctic was formed off the coast of the archipelago, which separates the East Siberian Sea and the Laptev Sea to the north [...] north of Siberia, in December 2018. Sediments, and even small pebbles and bivalves, were incorporated into the ice during the freezing process, which the on-going melting process has brought to light on

on variations of sea ice along the Northern Sea route Computation of length of navigation season for the Northern Sea route along the Russian coast Retrospective modeling of synoptic sea ice dynamics and [...] (WP3) • Cyclone and wind-wave activities influencing sea ice dynamics and risk of navigation along Northern Sea routes (WP4) • Impact of Arctic sea ice and cyclones on biodiversity and productivity of [...] global feedbacks between atmosphere, sea ice and impacts on ocean circulation systems will be determined. • The role of changed Arctic sea ice conditions for Northern Sea routes will be computed using POLARIS

Researchers of the Alfred Wegener Institute Helmholtz Centre for Polar and Marine Research, together with the Bremerhaven Zoo have developed a special exhibition on the reintroduction of the European oyster (Ostrea edulis) into the North Sea. On display are living European oysters in an aquarium, a detailed model of an oyster reef and its inhabitants as well as background information on the ecological importance of the species in the exhibition.

(Photo: Alfred-Wegener-Institut) LC-MS/MS chromatogram of a planktonic field samples from the North Sea containing several phycotoxins. Chemical structures of several phycotoxin classes. Current list

for the polar regions Sea Ice Motion and Deformation Envisat ASAR image of different sea ice types (© ESA / Envisat, 2006) (Photo: Alfred Wegener Institut) Drift and deformation of sea ice Polynias Terra [...] topic is called “ZackSAR”. Here, radar remote sensing data are evaluated for Zackenberg valley in north east Greenland. In 2013 and 2014, expeditions took place in the area. During field work, the environmental

sediments are used to reconstruct different climate variables as e.g. past changes in sea surface temperature and sea-ice variability (Uk ' 37 ; IP 25 ) or circulation dynamics (δ 13 C; δ 18 O). Ultra h [...] et al. (2014) Figure 2: Detailed Comparison of sedi-ment proxy records from the subpolar North Pacific and North Atlantic realm from 138 to 70 ka on their established time scales (Max et al., 2014). Source:

how the SHW interacted with past changes in sea surface temperature and how this is linked to changes in Antarctica. We aim to reconstruct precipitation and sea surface temperature on decadal to millennial [...] southern hemisphere westerly wind belt (SHW) encircles Antarctica, tracking the mid-latitude meridional sea surface temperature gradient (e.g. Lamy et al., 2010 ). The SHW is an important component of global [...] understanding of the dynamics of the SHW and temperature evolution. To this end, we investigate a north-south transect of marine and lake sediment cores spanning the range of the SHW (Fig. 1). From these

east of the Ross Sea operated in either dextral strike-slip or extensional motion throughout the region to the south and east of the Amundsen Sea Embayment and in the Bellingshausen Sea sector, connecting [...] on the Amundsen Sea shelf: (1) distributed rifting events parallel to the breakup front, (2) the influence of the Bellingshausen Plate motion with a plate boundary through the Amundsen Sea Embayment, and [...] and geothermal heat-flow data to improve our understanding of the role of the Amundsen Sea and Bellingshausen Sea shelves and margins in context of the continental breakup, activities of the West Antarctic

future projection experiments (e.g., sea ice outlook).We have been developed data assimilation system which exploits observed sea ice concentration, ice thickness and sea ice drift obtained from satellite [...] successfully applied to North Atlantic/Arctic Ocean Sea Ice Model (NAOSIM) developed at the Alfred Wegener Institute (AWI). We are currently working to apply the systems to Finite-volumE Sea ice-Ocean Model (FESOM2) [...] fields”, which are a set of ocean and sea ice variables optimally combining observations and a model. The analysis fields are applied for a variety of ocean and sea ice studies in the Arctic Ocean, and