“Preserve the Polar Regions and Glaciers”: A major philatelic event for the closing of IPY in March 2009 Last Saturday September 20t 2008, at the “Austria Center Vienna”, a few steps from the UN Headquarter in Vienna, have been officially presented the major philatelic event concerning the “International Polar Year 2007-2009”. To pay tribute to all the efforts made during this fourth “International Polar Year” 2007-2009 and to deliver a strong message aimed at the whole world, the postal administrations of around 40 countries have decided to joint to produce a common stamp issue concerning the problem of the Global Warming and featuring the slogan “Preserve the Polar Regions and Glaciers”. Started ...

The Scientific Committee on Antarctic Research (SCAR) - Sixth Continent Initiative fellowship 2008 award has just been granted to the Hungarian Ramón Hegedüs. The marine environment around Antarctica offers unique possibilities for studying the adaptations of visually-based animal navigation systems and foraging techniques. Currently working on a PhD in statistical and biological physics, this 26-year-old intends to investigate 'The role of polarized skylight in animal navigation and foraging in the Antarctic'.In his abstract research plan, Ramón explains that migration between h...

On March 1 2007, students at schools around the world marked the advent of International Polar year by conducting an ice experiment. They then told the IPY community and the world by pinning a virtual balloon onto a web-based map showing exactly where they were. It proved to be quite a success, with hundreds of schools contributing so far. IPY enthusiasts also joined in, turning the map into a riot of red balloons. See the whole map here. For technical reasons, browsers don't like it if you show too many balloons at one time, so only the most recent 200 balloons are shown. However, you can see all contributed posts directly by browsing the directory from ...

The International Polar Year has begun. What a week! With US and UK launches on the Monday stirring up media attention, followed by an event in Portugal on the Wednesday and over 20 more national events on the day itself, March 1st 2007, we definitely hit the news! While traveling to Paris with Nicola, to prepare for the international launch, the phone didn't stop ringing, both sides of the Channel Tunnel and even on the Paris subway system! I was contacted by journalists as diverse as New Zealand Radio, an In-flight magazine, BBC World Service, Vatican Radio, Al Jazeera English, an Italian science magazine, Chinese TV networks, and Scientific American to name a few. During the International Ceremony itself, my phone kept shaking, and afterwards, on a tour of Paris, I saw ...

Thank-you to everyone who was involved with launch events, who launched virtual balloons, who launched real balloons (see the Swedish launch web-cast!), those behind the scenes, and those on stage. IPY Celebrations around the world on March 1st, and throughout this week, have been a huge success. You can watch those you missed on the Arctic Portal, or still launch your virtual balloon now, and throughout IPY, to recognise the importance of the polar regions to the whole planet. Here is a map showing balloons that have been launched around the world (you can zoom in on where you live or zoom out to see the world map!): ...

IPY launch events around the world can be viewed live at the Arctic Portal. We also encourage everyone to launch a virtual balloon and show how many people around the world care about the polar regions and are interested in IPY. Everyone is welcome to join in, young or old, polar or tropical! The Official Opening Ceremony takes place in Paris at 11am local time. That is UTC 10:00, or, 1am in Anchorage, 5am in New York, 7am in Santiago, 3.30pm in Calcutta, 7pm in Tokyo, and 9pm in Sydney. You can watch it live or after the event on the web at the Arctic Portal, where you will also find webcasts of other national launch events from around th...

Watch IPY launch events on-line at the Arctic Portal and elsewhere. Throughout this week, over twenty nations around the world are celebrating the launch of the International Polar Year 2007-2008. New Zealand, Indigenous People, Argentina, and the Ukraine have already held extremely successful events. This week, Monday will see Press and Participants gathering in London, Strasbourg, and Washington DC, and Portugal will be holding their kick-off event on Wednesday. Thursday is the big day, with the Global Launch occurring in Paris at 1000 UTC (1100 local Central European Time) and national celebrations in Australia, Brazil, Canada, China, Denmark, Greenland, Finland, France, Germany, Iceland, Italy, Japan, Norway, ...

The Greenland Ice Sheet is an outstanding archive of information about what the Earth’s climate was like in the past, and the water locked in its ice will have a major impact on sea level rise due to climate change. Because of this, understanding how Greenland will react to global warming is crucially important. By gathering seismic data, ice cores and using radar, laser ranging and echo sounders, this project will shed new light on the Greenland Ice Sheet and improve scientists’ ability to model how it will react to climate change.