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, ...

Activities carried out from Tierra del Fuego in Argentina for the IPY 2007-2008 1) In accordance with chapter 3.3.4 of the IPY Framework, a group of students from the National University “Universidad Nacional de la Patagonia “San Juan Bosco” has been stationed at an Argentinean Station in Antarctica, “Camara base”, at Half Moon Island in the South Shetland Islands. The main idea is to help create awareness amongst cruise-tourists about the importance of the IPY and the lines of research proposed. This is carried out by handing out leaflets and giving further information to visitors on the island. For the antarctic season 2007/2008 we foresee to have as well students on other Argentinean stations. 2) The official opening ceremony for the IPY in Ushuai...

The goal of SPARC-IPY, who's full title is: The Structure and Evolution of the Polar Stratosphere and Mesosphere and Links to the Troposphere during IPY, is to document the dynamics, chemistry and microphysical processes within the polar vortices during IPY, with a focus on the stratosphere-troposphere and stratosphere-mesosphere coupling. One of the key outcomes will be a collection of analysis products from several operational centres and several research centres, which will be archived at the SPARC Data Center. The analysis products will cover the period of IPY (March 2007 to March 2009) and will represent the best available self-consistent approximations to the state of the atmosphere during this period.

For 61 weeks thousands of people around the world will follow, on a daily basis via the internet, the exciting voyage of the three-masted sailing ship SEDNA as she travels to Antarctica.

The Permafrost Young Researchers Network (PYRN) is hosting its kick-off meeting at the Abisko Scientific Research Station, Sweden on the 22nd to 24th of February 2007. PYRN (www.pyrn.org) is an international effort under the patronage of the International Permafrost Association (IPA) to bring young permafrost researchers together during the international polar year and beyond. The first phase of the PYRN project saw more than 300 young researchers from 31 countries join the network. It rapidly became the largest young researcher-driven network in the field of cryospheric science. PYRN offers, news, information and support to its members. It has sent 17 monthly newsletters since its start in 2005, maint...

Hello! Word about the IPY site is starting to get around! We just received an extremely well-written and passionate note from one of our past participants. A Battle with Nature by Sharon Querido - SOI Antarctic past participant In late August 2005, a horrible tragedy struck the nation: Hurricane Katrina flooded New Orleans, Louisiana. As the police lost control, anarchy in its worst form began to rise within the area. Though many people believe lawlessness can only lead to chaos, I have experienced anarchy as a utopia. Antarctica, exempt from governmental control by any country through the Antarctic Treaty of 1961, has become a peaceful, international territory. In December of 2005, I was invited to attend an education...

Plate tectonics and polar ocean gateways: The keys to understanding long-term global change Water mass exchange between world oceans is of great significance for long-term global climatic change and is controlled by tectonic and sedimentary evolution of oceanic gateways and basins. Reconstructions of the geological history of polar oceanic basins and gateways feed into computer simulations of climate change. PLATES & GATES is an international program focussing on the tectonic and sedimentary formation of those areas of the Arctic and Antarctica which are in particular critical for global change.