Somewhat only equalled with the month of May before the summer time, November is always a busy one. And it certainly has been for POLARIS with four nearly back-to-back workshops including:

1. SVALCLIME MagellanPlus workshop – SVALCLIME: Deep-time Arctic climate archives: High-resolution coring of Svalbard’s sedimentary record 18-21 October 2022, Longyearbyen, Norway 
2. iEarth GeoLearning Forum – 7-8 November Bergen, Norway https://www.iearth.no/feed/geolearning-forum-2022-recap
3. CEED final symposium – Earth’s History, Dynamics, and Planetary Habitability 14-18 November 2022 Sundvollen, Norway
4. NorthGreen MagellanPlus Workshop – NorthGreen: Northeast Greenland: Unlocking records from sea to land 21-23 November 2022, Copenhagen, Denmark

Let’s see what December brings!

A new paper has arrived! It looks at sediments deposited around 400 Myrs ago in Svalbard and its relation to nearby major tectonic and mountain building events. It is the result from field work in 2019, and subsequent analyses, and was spear-headed by POLARIS collaborator Owen Anfinson at Sonoma State University, USA:

Anfinson, O. A., Odlum, M. L., Piepjohn, K., Poulaki, E. M., Shephard, G. E., Stockli, D. F., et al. (2022). Provenance analysis of the Andrée Land Basin and implications for the paleogeography of Svalbard in the Devonian. Tectonics, 41, e2021TC007103. https://doi.org/10.1029/2021TC007103

If you don’t have access to the paper let me know and I can send a copy.

During October 2022 I have been in Svalbard for our annual course at UNIS AGx51 (Arctic Tectonics and Volcanism). The course was not able to be held in the last two years due to the pandemic so it was fantastic to be up again. There were 15 students from MSc and PhD level, and who represented every continent on Earth (bar the big icy one). One of the highlights was the four-day field excursion onboard the Polarsyssel. Another was the arrival of the long night and some beautiful aurora with it. The course in 2023 is planned for April-May.

Over the summer, Annabel Flatland, a Bachelors students from Williams College in Massachusetts, USA, joined me for a summer placement in Oslo. Annabel received a scholarship from her university to spend her summer months here. On an otherwise very quiet campus here in Blindern, she learned about plate tectonics, geophysical data, the Arctic, seamounts, and was introduced to the software programs, GPlates and GMT. She also wrote a really nice blog piece on some of the names behind Arctic features. A keen coder, she also focussed on further developing her python skills in data analysis, visualization and database construction. There was also some norsk språk lessons on the side!

For 3 weeks in August 2022 I was onboard the R/V Helmer Hanssen exploring the Barents Sea in the region south and southeast of Svalbard.

It is always a pleasure being up in Arctic, and when I saw the chance to be part of the science team I was very happy to join! My previous sea-going experience was back in 2016 when I was onboard I/B Oden to the central Arctic Ocean for 6 weeks.

It is a very international cruise, with 9 different nationalities, from six institutions, joining forces to map the polar seafloor and subsurface. This cruise is also an educational exercise, with students from Bologna University, Kiel University, UiT, and UiO onboard. The cruise is part of both a UiT and UiO course, as well as a UNESCO Teaching-Through-Research course (TTR-22; formerly “The Floating University”).

The main aim of the expedition, “CAGE-22-6-HH,” is to map sites of active fluid flow on the seafloor and understand their geological setting. In turn, the fate of released gases and hydrocarbons, whether in the water column or through to the atmosphere, can be studied and ideally quantified. This is particularly important for the strong greenhouse gas methane, which resides in the deeper layers. The Barents Sea is also an important ancient analogue for the Western Antarctic Shelf where known methane deposits exist and, due to climate change, their release to the atmosphere may have a significant effects on the climate in years to come.

I learned a lot about glacigenic features, in particular, and also how much I miss the sea-ice for a bit of protection from the waves. I wrote more about the expedition over on the CEED Blog and there are other posts over on the instagram account.

The Arctic Science Summit Week (ASSW2022) was held in Tromsø, northern Norway from 26-31 March 2022. The meeting is organized by the International Arctic Science Committee (IASC), this year in coordination with the Norwegian Research Council. POLARIS PI Grace Shephard is the co-representative for Norway for the IASC Marine Working group. This requires an overview of recent, active and upcoming plans for Arctic marine science in Norway, as well as in a cross-cutting and international framework. With other Norwegian IASC working groups and NFR, we are actively working on generating a mailing list to help disseminate information with the (diverse!) Norwegian marine polar community, and to in-turn receive feedback efficiently.

To mark the start of the project (1st Dec 2021) we have launched the POLARIS website – it is still being updated (nice figures and cool science takes time) – but hope you enjoy your visit and come back soon.

If you spot anything erroneous, unclear, or would like more information please contact the project leader Grace Shephard [grace dot shephard at geo dot uio dot no].