Polar Pint of Science - Bristol

Subglacial Lake Mercer is about the same size as lake Windermere, but it lies about a kilometre beneath the surface of the Antarctic Ice Sheet. I was lucky enough to join an American Project, SALSA, which drilled into the lake just after Xmas 2018. This is only the second time that a sub-Antarctic lake has been sampled. I’ll show you the types of equipment you need to do the job properly, show you our living quarters, and talk you through some of the first results. The great news is that we found microbes happily growing in the sediment within the lake. These microbes are adapted to the cold and dark of the lake, and gain energy from “eating” rocks and gases. I’ll talk you through how we made sure that we didn’t introduce these microbes into the lake as we were drilling the hole and doing the sampling. Finally, I’ll talk you through how the lake fills and drains with water and sediment.

Images of melting glaciers and threat of rising sea levels are forefront when talking about climate change, but the ice mass loss is not the only important change facing the polar regions. Glaciers and Ice Sheets are also seen as “nutrient factories”, providing fertilisation to primary producers in downstream ecosystems. We are interested in how these important nutrients are used once they are transported away from the ice sheet by melt waters. And how can what we observe now, help us predict what we might expect to change in the future as glaciers retreat and melting increases.

Antarctica is known as a ‘continent for science’ and the vast majority of people conducting research on the continent are scientists. Over the last few years, however, academics from the humanities and social sciences have become increasingly active in studying the Antarctic continent. With a focus on my work as an environmental historian in the McMurdo Dry Valleys area of Antarctica, this talk will explore the way historical research can contribute to environmental management in Antarctica. Historians can provide context for the development of environmental protection measures as well as finding information about the nature and extent of past ‘human impacts’ across the continent. The talk will suggest that there are lots of similar opportunities for humanities and social science research to collaborate with scientists in both Antarctica and the Arctic.