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Blog Tundra Stories: Background of the April-May 2013 expedition

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Created on Wednesday, 10 April 2013 13:44
 
image blog 10042013Probably, if you followed us during the previous expedition, you have already learned what permafrost is and why it is so important to observe it. (If you haven't, please find the post from 7 August, 2012).
 
Now I want to tell you a little bit more specifically about our plans for this expedition and the background for our activities.
 
I don't need to tell you that the ground in the north regions of our planet contains a lot of ice. With the beginning of spring season i.e. with the onset of positive temperatures, the ice within the ground starts melting. And as you also probably know, when the ice melts, it looses about 10% of its volume. That's why the ground surface can go down during this period. This settling down is known as the surface subsidence. It can go down as deep as a few cm per season. The process is alternating by migration of melted water within the soil. Therefore, the surface subsidence is directly dependent on the ice content in the ground.
 
What you also might already know is that the ice within the ground contains a lot of carbon dioxide and methane. When the ice melts, naturally all gas is released to the atmosphere through the ground. That's why it's extremely important to know the ice content within the soil.
 
It can sound rather unbelievable, but one can use remote sensing observation to measure the relative surface subsidence. More detailed explanation will come within the next posts. For now, let's just imagine that we have such information. Of course, we need some in-situ measurements for the satellite data validation.
 
That's why we will go to the Lena Delta and will install there ultrasonic sensors, which will measure the distance between the device and the ground during the whole thawing season. Having such dataset, we can easily obtain the relative subsidence.
 
 
 
 

Blog Tundra Stories: Introducing the Research Team

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Created on Monday, 08 April 2013 21:32
 
Hereby we are starting our new round from the field in Samoylov and we really hope that you missed us.

My name is Sonya, I´m the new blog-writer for the "Tundra Stories" from Samoylov. This time we are six people from AWI and going to cold Arctic in April and May.
 
Let me introduce the new team members and remind you about experienced 'wolfs'.
 
Antonova photo smallMy name is Sofia Antonova, but I am more used to my informal name Sonya, which I like more. I am a PhD student at AWI Research Unit Potsdam and my main task in this expedition will be installing the ultrasonic sensors for measuring the surface subsidence (don´t worry, you will find more details within the following posts). Originally I come from South West Siberia. I have been to Tiksi before, but never to Samoylov, so I´m one of the newcomers during this expedition.
 
 
 
Niko Bornemann croppedNiko Bornemann studied Geoecology at the University of Potsdam and wrote his diploma thesis at the AWI Research Unit Potsdam. Since 2013 he is an engineer and will visit the second time northern Siberia. He is responsible for the maintenance and installation of climate, hydrological and soil monitoring stations. His special interest is permafrost hydrology and their measurement. He is also a newcomer during this expedition.
 
 
 
 
Moritz Langer small croppedDr. Moritz Langer is a PostDoc at AWI Research Unit Potsdam and has been involved in activities around the Samoylov Research Station since 2007 and is the scientific coordinator of all AWI research at the site. For him it is 10th expedition to the Russian Arctic and he is the head and soul of the team. Besides his own scientific goals, he will supervise and teach newcomers how to deal with sensors and instruments in the field.
 
 
 
 
Hanno MeyerDr. Hanno Meyer is a geologist and responsible for the isotope laboratory of the AWI Research Unit Potsdam. He has done research in Siberia since 1998, but 2002 was the first time he visited Samoylov Island. He will mainly work together with Thomas Opel. To improve the understanding of recent ice wedge genesis one focus of his work will be to survey the spatial distribution and characteristics of the snow cover (stratigraphy, density, sampling for stable-water isotope analysis) at Samoylov Island.
 
 
 
 
 
 
Opel Thomas smallDr. Thomas Opel is a geographer and is working on the Late Holocene climate history of the Russian Arctic. This spring campaign is his fifth expedition to the Siberian Arctic, but the first not in summer. It will be his third visit of Samoylov Island. Together with Hanno Meyer he will survey the spatial distribution and the conditions of frost cracks above the ice wedges and will drill cores of the frozen active layer to study freezing processes.
 
 
schneiderWaldemar Schneider is the logistics expert of the team. He navigates in the Russian visa jungle, organizes and manages the cargo, and cares for guests and visiting scholars. His knowledge of the station is indispensable in expeditions to the Lena Delta.
 
 
 
 
 
 
Also, scientists from Hamburg University, WSL Research Center in Davos as well as Russian colleagues from AARI and LDR will join the expedition. All in all we are 12 people and we are going to share all hardships and, of course, pleasures of the field life during one month.
 
You can reasonably raise this question – what are we going to do in Arctic in winter? You are right – it is still winter on Samoylov with mean temperatures of -20°C and how the permafrost can be investigated under the snow cover? Fact is, that extremely important process, namely ground thawing, starts usually in the end of May (vary from year to year). So, we need to be sure that we don't miss the beginning of thawing. That's why we are going to install our measuring sensors as soon as possible. Besides, and it should be still cold enough, cause we are planning to perform snow and lake ice sampling.