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"The following news article, Ocean Acid Threatens Food Chain, reveals some current ocean acidification research as it relates to little-known, but highly significant creatures, the Pteropods. They are tiny, exquisite, and are critical at the base of the food web. As we study the impact of ocean acidification on their delicate shells, we learn more about the potential broader implications of changing ocean chemistry."

"Science: Methane Gas Release from Arctic Permafrost is Far Larger Than Expected Ancient permafrost submerged in the Arctic Ocean is releasing methane gas into the atmosphere at rates comparable to previous estimates for all the world's oceans combined, researchers say. This underwater permafrost represents a large but previously overlooked source of methane, and experts say that similar but more widespread emissions of the gas could have dramatic effects on global warming in the future."

Polar Science News

"Marine snow is a shower of organic material falling from upper waters to the deep ocean"

The R/V Knorr sets sail from the capital city of the Azores, Porta Delgada, on June 10, 2010 with researcher Lloyd Keigwin, his science team, the crew of the R/V Knorr and three teachers from Massachusetts. This research cruise will take them all the way across the North Atlantic back to R/V/ Knorr's homeport at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute (WHOI) over the course of three weeks. One thing about WHOI - their work is of such good quality, that the blog will be useful far beyond the life the expedition!

ICE Ice rises ICE Ice rises is a climate project studying the ice rises on the surface of the Antarctic ice shelves and along the edge of the ice. The goal is to determine if, and in that case how, these "islands" affect how fast the ice is moving toward the ocean, which in turn may influence the melting process and a potential rise in sea level.

This is an animation of sea ice volume change over the past 3 decades. It uses PIOMAS modeling data (Pan-Arctic Ice Ocean Modeling and Assimilation System) from the University of Washington. Data is very hard to understand and visualize - these folks did a nice job making it more accessible through this animation.

CarbonTracker, a project of the U.S. government's National Oceanic & Atmospheric Administration's Earth System Research Laboratory, has produced a telling time-lapse video chart of CO2 (Carbon Dioxide) concentrations starting in January of 1979 and ending in January of 2011. Measurements were taken in dozens of locations around the world (the red ball measures CO2 in Hawaii and the blue dot measures CO2 at the South Pole)

"The Polar Science Center (PSC) is a unit of the Applied Physics Laboratory at the University of Washington. Polar Science Center researchers observe and model the physical processes that control the nature and distribution of sea ice and polar ice sheets, the structure and movement of high-latitude oceans, and the interactions between air, sea, ice and biota. The Center has made major contributions to the understanding of how the arctic system has undergone important changes during the past four decades."

Polar Science

This site and document will help educators integrate the polar regions into their curricula. From the site: "The Earth Science Literacy Initiative (ESLI), funded by the National Science Foundation, has gathered and codified the underlying understandings of Earth sciences into a succinct document that will have broad-reaching applications in both public and private arenas. It establishes the "Big Ideas" and supporting concepts that all Americans should know about Earth sciences. The resulting Earth Science Literacy framework will also become part of the foundation, along with similar documents from the Oceans, Atmospheres and Climate communities, of a larger geoscience Earth Systems Literacy effort."

polar science curriculum resources

Many PBS shows can be streamed from here. A few examples: NOVA'a Ocean 'Tipping Point', NOVA's 'Extreme Ice', NOW on PBS'a 'On Thin Ice' Wide Angle's 'Burning Season', Nature's 'Under Antarctic Ice,' and many more. Many videos are time 'chunked' making them more amenable for classroom use. Once a video is selected, mouse over the screen to show the full screen and other options.

videos and related media

A Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute site for their IPY polar region expeditions. Good background, moderately interactive features (great graphic of the arctic ocean currents) and a variety of other resources.

polar science

"Responding to the challenge of climate change requires understanding more about climate variability and the changes expected. Jim Kinter, director of the Center for Ocean-Land-Atmosphere Studies (COLA), explains how scientists there are using supercomputers to learn more about the interactions among earth's land, air and sea."

"Scientists at George Mason University's Center for Ocean-Land-Atmospheric Studies are working on more accurate climate predictions that will help us plan for the future"

The charismatic narwhal is the legendary 'unicorn of the sea'. It's also thought that narwhal horns used in trade or washed up on beaches gave credence to the myth of unicorns on land.

The [US} Interior Department on Tuesday opened an urgent review of Arctic offshore drilling operations after a series of blunders and accidents involving Shell Oil's drill ships and support equipment, culminating in the grounding of one of its drilling vessels last week off the coast of Alaska.

Few people think of osmosis as a way to help feed the world's hunger for energy. But an experiment under way on a coastal inlet in Norway may help draw attention to the power packed in the salty seas.

There are a lot of teacher resources at NOAA. The quickest way to IPY specific materials is to enter "IPY" in the search space.

IPY agencies

"NASA scientist Thorsten Markus shares his expertise on polar ice in a lecture at the Library of Congress. In his lecture, Markus summarizes recent observations and findings-together with pictures from Arctic and Antarctic research campaigns-and puts those results into the bigger climate-system picture. He focuses on recent changes in the Arctic and in Antarctica. Markus explains why the two hemispheres react differently to climate change, and concludes his lecture by discussing current and future efforts to address the uncertainties and contradictions of the ice conditions."

videos and related media