Melissa Lau spent a month in the tundra ecosystem gathering data using a device called a Greenseeker. This device measures exactly how green a plant is by calculating its NDVI or Normalized Difference Vegetation Index. In this lesson, students will explore light waves, how they interact with plants, and find out how green is green.
Safety First Just like at school, here on the ship we practice what we'd do in an emergency. We have drills that simulate what would happen in case of a fire, a person overboard, or if we ever we had to abandon ship. As a passenger, drills mostly involve us grabbing a life jacket, a float suit
Sif Island The ice in Antarctica is melting. There were multiple stories in the news yesterday about ponds forming in the land ice- thanks to Emily and Pedro via Alex for the links to the stories in the [Washington Post](https://www.washingtonpost.com/weather/2020/02/24/antarctic-heat-wave-melted
Bio Sonar In 1977, it snowed in Miami, Elvis died, scientists used bacteria in a lab to make insulin via gene cloning, Apple II computers and Atari systems went on sale, I turned 2, and the first Multibeam Echosounder became commercially available. But for millions of years prior to 1977, bats
Take a close look at the diagram below, which was produced by the British Antarctic Survey to show how a multibeam works. This is the primary tool we use on the ship to collect information about the shape of the seafloor. Does it remind you of anything? What animals do you think they studied in
Topography of the Seafloor Prior to my participation in this expedition, I can't say that I had ever thought about bathymetry, or the study of the shape of the seafloor. While land topography, with its uphills and downhills, has a lot of relevance to my life, I couldn't imagine why the
Brittle Star For someone who is a biologist at heart, there hasn’t been a lot of life to study onboard this ship. I’ve learned a lot about sediment and the ways it is collected and processed, and I’m even able to help out sometimes. But when I’m anywhere near a core, I’m always hoping there will
Ice Rafted Debris By far, the best place on the ship to work is the aft control room. It offers eight large windows that look out over the water so you can watch the ice or keep your eye on the horizon when the seasickness starts to kick in. While it is a hub of activity when coring devices are
This lesson investigates the effects of different insulators (fur and blubber) on maintaining the body temperature of polar animals. Water balloons filled with warm water simulate the marine mammal. The blubber insulator will be simulated by covering the balloon in vegetable shortening. The fur insulator will be simulated by placing another balloon over the “marine mammal” and adding an
There Are Fish!## On October 23, 2019 I posted a journal about the different strategies MOSAiC researchers were using to study fish in the Central Arctic Ocean. Studying these fish is challenging. Not only do the dark, cold, icy
