In the 99 years since the first successful expedition to the South Pole, climate change scientists, astrophysicists, marine biologists, geologists and ecologists have turned Antarctica into something of a mecca for scientific research. Now, just shy of the centenary year celebrations of that 1910-1911 expedition led by Norwegian Roald Amundsen, an 8-member Indian team has set out to achieve a national milestone?the country?s maiden expedition to the South Pole.
The team, led by National Centre for Antarctic and Ocean Research (NCAOR) director Dr Rasik Ravindra, will over the 40-day journey from the Indian Maitri base to the South Pole and back conduct research on how the environment of the icy continent has altered in the last 1,000 years. The team plans to collect short cores near the American Amundsen-Scott station, en route to the South Pole. It will also conduct studies on atmosphere aerosols, snow chemistry, magnetic data and bacteria that can survive in extreme conditions.
Scientists have previously used ice cores, or samples from some of the oldest and deepest parts of the ice sheet covering Antarctica, to study mean atmospheric temperature and composition of the atmosphere, and even to try and establish a co-relation between the level of carbon dioxide in the air and atmospheric temperatures.
Over the years, scientists have been able to study from their Antarctic research stations Southern Ocean ecosystem, including sea birds, the diversity, ecology and population dynamics of the organisms living beneath the Antarctic sea ice, the alterations in ambient temperature in the eastern and westerns parts of the continent, and provide scientific advice on conservation and environmental management to the Antarctic Treaty System. The system manages international relations on the uninhabited continent, where several nations including the US, the UK, China and India have set up their research stations.
Indian scientists first travelled to Antarctica in December 1981, and have since contributed to polar science through monitoring of surface weather parameters and the hole in the ozone layer over the Maitri station. Among their more significant findings are an event of major stratospheric warming in 2002 and that the depth of the hole in the ozone over the Maitri base has been fluctuating year-on-year. In 1974, American scientists had first linked the depletion of the Ozone layer over the icy continent with the use of chloroflorocarbons, or CFCs. By 1985, British scientists at the Halley Bay station in Antarctica had begun noticing alarming effects of the hole in the ozone layer.
The 30th Indian expedition to Antarctica comes even as construction activity on the country?s third research base the Larsemann Hills station in East Antarctica, a part of which was contiguous with India?s east coast 120 million years ago, has commenced. The station, which will be at a distance of 2,000 km from the Maitri base, will put India in the club of nation that have multiple Antarctic research bases.
Also this year, the Scientific Committee on Antarctic Research has awarded its fellowship for 2010-11 to NCAOR?s Sushil Kumar Shukla for his study on climate change over the history of the earth, using a diatom algae census. India is indeed pulling out all stops to make a mark on the polar science map this year.