September 21 is excellent timing for a sea ice day. There is a tremendous amount of sea ice activity going on. There was an international sea ice summer school with more than 100 students from dozens of countries in July. There is currently a tremendous amount of sea ice activity going on in IPY. This summer there have been icebreakers from Canada, Sweden, Russia, and the U.S. conducting research in the Arctic and deploying autonomous sensors to monitor the changing sea ice cover. There have been ice camps at the North Pole and in the Beaufort Sea, along with work out of terrestrial stations around the periphery of the Arctic. Right now, the Russians are deploying an ice station that will drift for a year or more. The Tara, part of the EU sponsored DAMOCLES project starts her second year of drift across the Arctic Ocean. Satellite observations show that ice loss continues and September 2007 has reached an all-time record minimum ice extent. Scientists working with field measurements, satellite data, autonomous observing systems, and models are working together to understand the causes of the changes in the ice cover. It is truly a wonderful time to be studying sea ice."
Here is a list of Sea Ice experts happy to be contacted by media or educators in conjunction with the September 21st International Polar Day.
National Snow and Ice Data Center
contact: Stephanie Renfrow, Public Information Officer: 303.492.1497 or This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it
Stephanie can set up interviews with sea ice scientists and IPY participants Mark Serreze, Ted Scambos, Walt Meier, and Julienne Stroeve, as well as arrange interviews with IPY data projects lead Mark Parsons
SIPEX: Sea Ice Physics and Eco-system eXperiment
This Antarctic cruise involves 45 scientists from 8 different countries happy to conduct interviews by prior arrangement (email or phone). For more information about the expedition, please visit the SIPEX website.
To interview a scientist on board the Aurora Australis, please email This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it .
NOTE: Sandra is on board the ship and can only receive TEXT ONLY emails.
Scientists on board include Tony Worby (voyage leader, expert in sea ice
physics), Klaus Meiners (expert in biology, German/English), Jan Lieser (sea ice physics), Andreas Krell (molecular biology, German/English), Delphine Lannuzel (iron in sea ice, French), Thorsten Markus (NASA),and Ian Allison, co-chair of the International Polar Year Joint Committee. There are also scientists on board who could take interviews in Finnish, Chinese, and Japanese.
DAMOCLES
IPY 40 DAMOCLES
Contact to Expeditions:
Polarstern
Participating countries: Germany, Russia, Finland, the Netherlands, Spain, US, Switzerland, Japan, France and China.
Objective: To quantify and understand past and present natural environmental and social change in the polar regions, and to improve projections of future change.
Email: This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it in Germany, Tel: +49 (0)471 - 4831-1820, Languages: German/English
Contact to Ursula Schauer onboard RV Polarstern can be facilitated by press officer This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it , Phone: +49 (0) 471 4831 1742 and This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it , Phone: +49 (0) 471 4831 - 1180
Tara Arctic
Participating countries: New Zealand, France, Estland, Monaco, Norway (Summer 2007 crew. On board until September 28)
Objective: The challenge of the polar schooner Tara is to drift on the Arctic pack ice for two years. On board, scientists take turns to study the effects of climate change.
To arrange interviews with the Tara crew about life on the ice, please contact This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it and This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it . Phone: 00 33 1 42 01 38 57 / 00 33 6 12 13 04 67
Akademik Fedorov
Participating countries: US, France, Russia and Germany
Objective: To install the new Russian drifting station NP35. During the drift, the station's measurements will provide current climate change data. This project intends to identify key processes in the atmosphere and alterations of the sea ice cover in order to examine how the sea ice and atmosphere interfere.
Contact: This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it and This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it "} (on board), Sat. comm.No: Phone 00871/00873 - 327326210
Lance
Participating countries: Germany, the Netherlands, Switzerland, Finland, UK and Norway.
Objective: Investigate ice melting and changes in ocean currents in the Fram strait.
Contact: This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it (on board), Satelite phone: 00 88 16 31 45 97 19
Viktor Buinitskiy
Participating countries: US, Russia, Canada, UK, France, Germany
Objective: To recover and deploy moorings (MMP) along the continental slope north of Spitsbergen and north of Severnaya Zemlya.
Contact: This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it , Phone +1 (907) 4742686
This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it (Chief Scientist) (on board)
NORCLIM
IPY 120 Northern Climate Variability
The Newfoundland expedition takes place the end of September onboard the Russian vessel R/V Akademik loffe with participants from Denmark, Canada, Russia and the Netherlands. We will do seismics and sediment coring in several bays, including Bonavista Bay. One of the main targets is to reconstruct variations in sea-ice conditions during the past 2000 years.
Chief scientist: This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it co-chiefs: This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it and This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it .
Individual Contacts: (alphabetically by surname)
, Norwegian Polar Institute, Norway, Phone +47 77750524, Languages: Norwegian/English
Website
Author in UNEP Global Outlook On Ice and Snow: IPY 440
Expertise in polar bear biology/ecology. Only available until September 19th
This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it , Canada Research Chair in Arctic System Science, University of Manitoba, Canada
Phone: (204) 474-6981 (UofM office)
Research Website
IPY-Circumpolar Flaw Lead (CFL) system study, part of IPY 26 Sea Ice & Arctic Marine Ecosystems PAN-AME
David is a specialist on the effects of climate change on sea ice dynamic and thermodynamic processes. Here is a short biography.
Dr David Carlson
International Polar Year International Programme Office, Web Profile
This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it , Director +447715371759 (Languages: English)
David can paint a broad picture of the importance of studying Sea Ice during the IPY, and projects that are involved.
, Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine Research, Germany
Phone: +49(471)4831-1808 Languages: German/English
A sea ice ecologist with special interest in the biogeochmeistry and primary production of sea ice. He is involved in interdisciplinary projects with sea ice physicists and molecular biologists dealing with the effects of sea ice formation and growth on sea ice organism distribution and survival strategies. He is co-editor of the the book: Sea ice : an introduction to its physics, chemistry, biology, and geology / ed. by David N. Thomas and Gerhard S. Dieckmann, Oxford [u.a.] : Blackwell Science, 402 pp.
This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it
Phone: +34 971 611725, Languages: Spanish/English
IPY 92 Climate & Ecosystem Dynamics
IPY 38 Ocean-Atmosphere-Ice Interactions
IPY 35 GEOTRACES
Carlos Duarte is part of the IPY ATOS project (Atmospheric inputs of organic carbon and pollutants to the polar ocean: rates, significance and outlook ). This Spanish-led study is a biopolar project that contributes to three IPY clusters: ICED, OASIS and GEOTRACES. ATOS will examine the impacts of sea ice melting, and the associated release of substances including pollutants, on the marine ecosystem.
This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it , Norwegian Polar Institute, Norway
Web profile
Phone: +47 77750 554
(Out of the office 17-20 Sep. On the 21 September, available at the NPI in Tromsø)
Author in UNEP Global Outlook On Ice and Snow: IPY 440
My working field is about sea ice physics and climate. I work especially with sea ice mass balance studies and sea ice optical properties in the Greenland Sea, around Svalbard and in the Arctic Basin. In my work, I investigate physical properties of snow and ice, the thickness development of snow and ice (sea ice growth and melt, the role of snow for freezing and melting of sea ice), and the optical properties of snow and ice (such as how much solar radiation is reflected by the sea ice surface).
IPY 153 Marine Mammal Explorations
(Not on email 12 September - 28 September)
Polar Marine Mammal Specialist working with a lot of ice-associated species like seals, whales and polar bears.
IPY 172 Bird Health
Languages: English, Norwegian
I have been monitoring a local goose population for 20 years in the Arctic so have expertise about the effect of ice conditions on goose populations.
This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it , British Antarctic Survey, UK
Phone: +44 1223 221 400
My research focuses primarily on sea ice growth and decay processes and the role of snow cover. The motivation is to understand what controls sea ice evolution and thickness, how it interacts with its environment, and ultimately, how it might respond to climate variation and change. I do this through a combination of field studies, modelling, and remote sensing. I have been involved in a variety of field programs in both the Arctic and Antarctic.
, P.P.Shirshov Institute of Oceanology, Russia
SASIE (Study of Antarctic Sea Ice Ecosystems: an ICED-IPY project) and PAICEX (PanArctic Ice Camp Expedition: an IPY project linked closely with IPY 92 ICED-IPY)
Phone: +7 916 604 3131, Languages: Russian/English
Website
IPY 90 Arctic Coastal Observatory Network
Phone: +49-331-288-2174, Languages: German/English
This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it
IPY 95 Sea Ice Properties & Processes
Cold Regions Research and Engineering Laboratory, Hanover, NH USA
Languages: English Phone: +1-603-646-4255
Web profile
My primary research interest is understanding the Arctic system and its role in global climate change. The overall goal of my research is to understand the present role of solar radiation in the Arctic atmosphere-ice-ocean system and improve the ability to predict its future role. The interaction of solar radiation with snow and sea ice is intimately interrelated with the physical and morphological properties of snow and ice and forcing from the atmosphere and ocean. In turn, solar radiation directly impacts the mass balance of the ice cover. Through the positive ice-albedo feedback, solar partitioning affects not only the Arctic system, but global climate as well. I am involved with IPY sea ice projects studying the seasonal ice zone (SIZONET), autonomously measuring sea ice mass balance, and examining sunlight in the atmosphere-ice-ocean system. The following web sites relate to these projects: Information on a network of sea ice mass balance buoys and Information on coastal and seasonal ice
, Executive Director, ANDRILL
Phone: +1 402 472-4785
Happy to discuss ANDRILL research and the role that sea ice plays in these projects. E.g., we use sea ice as a drilling platform; we conduct geophysical surveys over sea ice to plan future projects; microfossil groups (diatoms) that we study in the cores we collect reflect past sea ice conditions.
, Institut des sciences de la mer de Rimouski (ISMER), Canada
Phone: +1 (418) 723-1986 x1742, Languages: French/English
Web profile
The project I lead is called "International Polar Year: Natural Climate Variability and Forcings in Canadian Arctic and Arctic Ocean" and is funded by the Natural Science and Engineering Research Council of Canada. The main goal of the project is to document the evolution of sea surface condition in the Canadian Arctic and Arctic Ocean through the most recent geological time period (the Holocene - last 10,000 years) with emphasis on the evolution of the sea ice cover. We are using a variety of proxy indicators to assess the different climate variables (sea surface temperature, salinity, duration of sea ice cover) such as dinoflagellate cysts, foraminifers, pollen and spores from Arctic Lakes (continental climate), stable isotopes and paleomagnetic properties of the sediment.
My area of expertise is the evolution of sea surface conditions using dinoflagellate cysts as proxy indicators. We use transfer functions to quantitatively reconstruct the above-mentioned parameters. I also study the motile forms of dinoflagellates in different areas from the Canadian Arctic.
This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it , British Antarctic Survey, UK
Tel +44 (1223) 221485
Web Profile
Author in UNEP Global Outlook On Ice and Snow: IPY 440
My main expertise is in:
- the simulation of sea ice in climate models
- investigation of the mechanisms behind the year-to-year variability of sea ice extent
- understanding the different changes of sea ice extent in the two polar regions over recent decades. Major loss of ice in the Arctic against little change in the Antarctic.
- prediction of how sea ice extent will change over the next century.
, British Antarctic Survey, UK
IPY 20 Air-Ice Chemical Interactions
Phone +44 1223 221491
I am interested in the way in which sea ice changes the chemistry of the lowest layers of the atmosphere.