After months of preparations by the Polaris support team (Wendy Kingerlee, Scott Zolkos & Craig Connolly) we are just about ready to go.  Flights have been scheduled, visas have been issued and research supplies have been purchased, packed, and shipped!

Craig proudly displays a portion of the supplies that have been shipped to Siberia.

22 boxes of supplies are currently en route to NE Siberia, and many have already arrived.  The boxes include more than 15,000 pipette tips, 100+ incubation jars, 3 portable greenhouse gas analyzers, 20 meteorological stations, plus hundreds of bottles, bags, tubes and much, much more.

In addition to supplies sent this year, our research is supported by state-of-the-art research equipment at the Northeast Science Station, a “research oasis in the Arctic”.  Laboratory facilities are continually being expanded (see recent inventory on an earlier post), and this year is no exception.

Our preparations have one common purpose — to support research on climate change, permafrost thaw, and arctic ecosystems.  Core students are already starting to think about their research interests and how these tie into the goals of the Polaris Project. In the upcoming months, we’ll hear research updates from these new Polaris students and from returning students, who are well underway in refining their research plans.

Logistical arrangements are all in place, and now, it’s up to our team of student researchers to lead the way in exploring new places, thinking new ideas, and addressing some of the Earth’s most pressing scientific questions in one of the most magnificent and vulnerable areas on the planet.