Why is this polar research project needed?
- The ongoing climate change is noted most clearly at our northernmost and southernmost latitudes. We therefore need to learn more about what is happening in these areas and how it affects the rest of the world in order to adapt to the challenges of the future.
What type of research will be conducted?
- POLARIN (Polar Research Infrastructure Network) will enable researchers from all over the world to conduct research in both polar regions by providing access to 64 research infrastructures. These are research stations, research vessels and icebreakers, observatories on land and at sea, data infrastructures and storage sites for ice and sediment cores. Researchers from all fields can apply to gain access to the infrastructure.
What makes POLARIN unique?
- It is the first time that an EU infrastructure project connects research stations in both the Arctic and Antarctic with research stations and icebreakers. It will help to more easily get an overall picture of the ongoing environmental changes and their effects.
What role will you play in this work?
- Through me, Lund University is the coordinator for another EU project called INTERACT, which links all land-based research stations in the Arctic. We will bring everything we have learned from our project, which has been going on since 2011, into the new project and will mainly concentrate on the part of providing access to research stations and icebreakers.
What makes POLARIN unique?
- It is the first time that an EU infrastructure project connects research stations in both the Arctic and Antarctic with research stations and icebreakers. It will help to more easily get an overall picture of the ongoing environmental changes and their effects.
What role will you play in this work?
- Through me, Lund University is the coordinator for another EU project called INTERACT, which links all land-based research stations in the Arctic. We will bring everything we have learned from our project, which has been going on since 2011, into the new project and will mainly concentrate on the part of providing access to research stations and icebreakers.
How does the geopolitical situation with Russia's war of aggression against Ukraine affect polar research?
- Russia is half of the Arctic, so it is clear that it affects the monitoring of environmental changes in the Arctic in a drastic way. However, we keep our bridges open and hope that cooperation with our Russian colleagues can be resumed as soon as the geopolitical situation changes.
This text was first published in Swedish by Johan Joelsson at the Faculty of Science, Lund University. Translated and reposted at this website by Susanna Olsson, Dept. of Physical Geography and Ecosystem Science.