Association of Polar Early Career Scientists

 

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Polar Outreach Catalogue

ACEX to AGAVE
  • Educators, Teachers
In August 2004 an international team of scientists on 3 icebreakers embarked on a 6 week expedition to the Lomonosov Ridge in the central Arctic Ocean. Integrated Ocean Drilling Program Expedition 302 (ACEX - the Arctic Coring Expedition) drilled deep into the seafloor in search of sediments to answer questions about the prehistoric climate record of the Arctic Ocean. Three years later, in May 2007, another international team of scientists led by the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute traveled to the Arctic on one of the same icebreakers. This engineering trial of AGAVE - the Arctic Gakkel Vents Expedition - tested newly developed autonomous underwater vehicles for the first time under the ice pack with plans to deployed them in the search for evidence of life in deep sea Arctic vents.

Sailing alongside the scientists on both of these expeditions was Kathy Couchon, a science teacher from Narragansett, RI. As that teacher-researcher on the Swedish icebreaker, Oden, I was able to work with and learn from world-renown scientists on these "first-ever" expeditions. From the exciting new science content I learned, to sharing in the work of science - flying ice reconnaissance in a helicopter, setting out radar targets on ice floes, working on a drill deck processing sediment cores, launching and tracking AUVs in shifting ice, sifting ancient sediments, identifying paleomicrofossils - I was able to take back to the classroom a renewed sense of purpose.
  • Educational expedition - students
  • Educational expedition - teachers
Robert Sohn, Associate Scientist
Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution
Narragansett High School, Swedish Polar Secratariat, WHOI
Sweden, USA
August 2007 to December 2008
Arctic
No
No
Oslo Science Conference, Online survey

Contact APECS

APECS International Directorate
UiT The Arctic University of Norway
Huginbakken 14
9019 Tromsø
Norway
Email: info(at)apecs.is

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