Record numbers of Norwegian sea eagles are exported to Europe
Norwegian authorities exported a record number of white-tailed sea eagle chicks this summer. They are hatching new, viable populations in Ireland, Spain and Scotland.
“It is very likely that we will reach three degrees. I consider 1.5 and 2 degrees to be almost unattainable. Now the question is how close to three we will get,” says one Norwegian researcher.
SHARE YOUR SCIENCE: Pollen can travel far through the air, allowing scientists who find them to trace the winds of the past. Maaike Zwier writes about her new study from South Georgia, where ancient pollen may reveal shifts in the dominating westerlies.
Electric cars, mobile phones, wind turbines — modern technology needs metals that are almost exclusively found in China. Residues from Norwegian fertilizer production can help Europe become less dependent on a country that wants to produce more itself.
Climate change, loss of biodiversity, and degraded ecosystems: we're in trouble and something needs to be done. We need to change, and we know what to do. But we probably need some help on how to proceed. Maybe we can be inspired by Isaac Newton’s three laws?
On the JC2-2 cruise we are visiting the deep basins of the Arctic Ocean. The goal of my team is to conduct experiments with animals from the bottom of those basins, which means keeping deep, Arctic animals alive. If deep-sea diving is an extreme sport, then this is definitely extreme science.
The Arctic Ocean is composed of different layers organized on the vertical, and these layers have different temperature and salinity properties. A cold and fresh surface layer caps a warm and salty layer of Atlantic Water. The heat contained at depth (about 300m) in the warm and salty Atlantic Water could melt the entire Arctic sea ice cover if it reached the surface. It does not happen because the cold surface layer caps this Atlantic layer quite well and keeps it at depth. However, in some regions, such as north of Svalbard, sea ice melts in summer even though it is -30 outside. How is that possible?
Large trawlers are pulling tons of fish out of the deep Central Arctic Ocean. Our cell phones are powered with rare earth elements from the seafloor underneath the North Pole. The ice-free Arctic allows much shorter delivery time of shipped goods from the Atlantic to the Pacific. Coast guard ships dot the vast Arctic coastline and fleets of submarines survey the chilly waters. Will these scenarios soon be a reality? To some extent some of them already are.
The point of putting a lid on a cooking pot is to prevent the transfer of heat and moisture between the boiling contents and the air above. When you remove the lid from a boiling pot, heat and water vapour flow upward into the air, along with chemical compounds filling your kitchen with the (hopefully) promising smells of an upcoming meal.
Our scientific crew of 35 people for the Nansen Legacy cruise JC2-2-Arctic Basin will spend five weeks onboard the Norwegian icebreaker and research vessel Kronprins Haakon, with departure on Thursday 24th August 2021. Cruise leaders are Agneta Fransson (NPI) and Bodil Bluhm (UiT).
Waves marching through the sea ice is an amazing view. It is as if a white, snow-covered landscape suddenly starts gently undulating, the solid ground dancing rhythmically. The waves’ wildness from the open sea is tamed and dampened by the ice. Yet, the waves’ energy can break solid sea ice, greatly affecting sea ice drift, formation and melt. Hence, waves in ice are an important - yet not well understood - factor in the arctic physical environment.
The ocean is not as endless as we often think it is. It is actually divided into different domains and regions, ranging from the freezing cold polar waters to the hot tropical regions. Within each of the domains, species have evolved to deal with the challenging conditions within their home domain.
Here on RV “Kronprins Haakon” in the northern Barents Sea we are our own tiny world, living and working together in a bubble almost completely remote from our regular world. In our microcosm we are reminded that we all have to have some place to live, and to also understand how it works, so that the system we live in functions well.