SWERUS-C3 2014 - Meteorological, Oceanographic and Ship Data Collected on board the Icebreaker Oden

SWERUS-C3 was an international research expedition using the icebreaker Oden in the Arctic Ocean. The expedition was a Swedish/Russian/American collaboration, and some 80 researchers will operated in the northern stretches of the Laptev Sea, the East Siberian Sea and the Chukchi Sea. The researchers studied the interactions between the thawing cryosphere, the carbon system and the climate system.

The expedition embarked from Tromsø, Norway on 6 July and proceeded along the Russian polar sea to Barrow, Alaska. Researchers and crew were changed on 20 August in Barrow, when the second leg of the expedition began. The route back to Scandinavia crossed the Lomonosov Ridge, an underwater mountain chain near the North Pole, and the expedition returned to Tromsø on 4 October.

The main scientific questions concerned the linkages between climate, cryosphere, and carbon - hence the name “C3”. The researchers studied emissions of methane stored in the permafrost on the seabed as well as carbon transport routes in the sea and ice.

The main issues researchers were seeking to address during the first leg

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SWERUS-C3 was an international research expedition using the icebreaker Oden in the Arctic Ocean. The expedition was a Swedish/Russian/American collaboration, and some 80 researchers will operated in the northern stretches of the Laptev Sea, the East Siberian Sea and the Chukchi Sea. The researchers studied the interactions between the thawing cryosphere, the carbon system and the climate system.

The expedition embarked from Tromsø, Norway on 6 July and proceeded along the Russian polar sea to Barrow, Alaska. Researchers and crew were changed on 20 August in Barrow, when the second leg of the expedition began. The route back to Scandinavia crossed the Lomonosov Ridge, an underwater mountain chain near the North Pole, and the expedition returned to Tromsø on 4 October.

The main scientific questions concerned the linkages between climate, cryosphere, and carbon - hence the name “C3”. The researchers studied emissions of methane stored in the permafrost on the seabed as well as carbon transport routes in the sea and ice.

The main issues researchers were seeking to address during the first leg are concerned with the processes, sources and fluxes of methane in the East Siberian shelf seas, how they function today, and how it may evolve in the future. They analysed air and ocean water, measured the composition of ocean sediment and studied carbon and methane transport routes in sea and ice.

During the second leg, the researchers studied the history of the Arctic sea ice, the inflow of relatively warm Atlantic water and the conversion and transport of carbon from the East Siberian shelf seas to the deep seas of the Arctic Ocean. During both legs, researchers studied the role of the Arctic clouds in the climate system.

Purpose:

The purpose of the expedition was to study the processes, sources and fluxes of methane in the East Siberian shelf seas, how they function today, and how it may evolve in the future. In recent years, researchers have discovered that large amounts of carbon, including as methane, are being released from the thawing permafrost. This could represent a carbon-climate feedback, enhancing the ongoing global warming process. There are also traces of the evolution of the region in the sediment at the bottom of the Arctic Ocean. By studying this sediment, SWERUS-C3 researchers was hoping to determine whether or not there have been periods during the last million years when the summer sea ice was smaller than it is today, and if so, why. This long-term historical evolution is a key factor in understanding what is happening to the climate. today, and in our ability to predict what will happen in the future. Show less..