International Polar Year
Studying ways to approach the global warming issue
The Fourth International Polar Year study is underway in Antarctica and the Arctic to scientifically study the phenomena behind the warming of the earth's climate.
The International Polar Year is a multi-country scientific study of the ice sheets in the Arctic and Antarctic poles and the ocean waters surrounding them. It started in March of 2007 and runs for two years. Two hundred proposed experiments involving thousands of scientists from over 60 nations have started studies that should help us learn more about the continued warming of the climate over the earth. Scientists are studying physical, biological, and geological subjects with the goal of learning the interaction of the pole environments with the meteorological events over the globe.
In a press release from the U.S. National Committee for the International Polar Year Dr. Robin Bell, chair of the Committee and a geophysicist at the Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory, Columbia University, Palisades, N.Y said, "The polar regions are central to many of the key scientific questions of our times, IPY provides a framework to undertake projects that normally could not be achieved by any single nation, and it allows us to think beyond traditional borders—whether national borders or disciplinary constraints—toward a new level of integrated, cooperative science. IPY also will serve as a mechanism to attract and develop a new generation of scientists and engineers with the versatility to tackle complex global issues."
IPY is a chance for everyone to get involved and teachers over the world are participating in educating their students. A web site has been set up to help teachers and students stay informed. Here are some of the things the site outlines:
1. Ice investigations.
2. Launching a virtual balloon representing your school on the map.
3. Checking the frequently of balloons going up around the world.
4. Continuing to take part in IPY by learning about polar science in the classroom.
There have been three previous polar studies—1882-3, 1932-3, and 1957-8. In the Antarctic, there has been simi-continuous study over the years, and we know more about the continent than we do the ice cap over the North Pole. However, neither place has had much structured scientific study.
The first study in the 1880s involved the international cooperation of 12 countries, and 13 expeditions to the Arctic and 2 to the Antarctic were completed. While most of the accomplishments was connected with survival, that information was the base that has led to permanent “villages” by several nations in Antarctica in the last several years. The scientific knowledge obtained was important, but the coordinated scientific effort was a phenomenon that had never been accomplished before.
The Second IPY in the early 1930s had a main objective of studying the “jet stream” which had just been discovered in the early 1930s. Forty nations were involved in this research. Important advances in weather forecasting, earth magnetism, and atmospheric phenomena were learned during this study. The United States sent the second Byrd expedition establishing a year-round metrological station on the Ross Ice Shelf covering Roosevelt Island.
The Third IPY in the late 1950s involved sixty-seven nations conducting research with 12 nations maintaining 65 stations in Antarctica. Results from this study were some of the most important of all time: the long misunderstood theory of continental drift was established as a major foundation of geological oceanography; the discovery of the Van Allen Radiation Belt around the earth which resulted in vital advances in weather forecasting; the world’s first satellites were launched; and it led to the Antarctic Treaty signing in 1961. Cooperation between nations had remarkable outcomes.
The present study hopes to learn improved understanding of the consequences of warming on the ice sheets in Greenland and Antarctica. Let’s hope it is as successful as the first three IPYs.
