Manitoba research centre tackles tough questions on vanishing Arctic sea ice

As seen from space, the Arctic ice cap looks and acts like a giant amoeba splayed across the top of the world. It heaves and twists, reaches outward, then shrinks back.

“It’s constantly in motion,” says David Barber, while a time-lapse sequence of polar satellite images plays across his computer screen. The more scientists study the sea ice that floats atop the Arctic Ocean, the more it resembles something that lives and breathes, a dynamic membrane that hosts microbial communities, fosters chemical reactions and connects air with water in surprising ways. “It’s not just a cap, it’s an active participant in the system,” says Dr. Barber, who is director of the University of Manitoba’s Centre for Earth Observation Science. “That has global implications.”

Those implications matter to marine life, planetary weather patterns, human health and northern development – more than enough reason for the Arctic sea ice to warrant scientific attention. It has also motivated a major expansion at the centre, backed by a $10-million Canada Excellence Research Chair and $48-million in additional funding. The centre now has more than 100 scientists, graduate students and technicians, making it the world’s largest research group focused on sea ice. But even as the centre celebrates the opening of $15-million, state-of-the-art laboratory facilities next week – including custom freezers, where sea ice can be grown under carefully controlled conditions, and a remote-controlled submersible that can explore and sample the environment under the ice – a sense of urgency about the Arctic pervades the effort.  More...

Publication date: 
Sunday, March 17, 2013