photo: Noémie Planat
In the first week of May, 31 international Ph.D. students in polar climate science got the opportunity to learn about atmosphere-ice-ocean interaction and experience the polar climate on Svalbard. Due to the diversity of lecturers in this winter school, both students and lecturers could broaden their horizons and learn something off-topic. We discussed everything from sea-ice rheology to ocean mixing and cold air outbreaks from modeling and observational perspectives. During a boat trip in the fjord system of Svalbard, we saw many of the processes we had looked into during the lectures, such as different types of sea-ice and interactions between ice floes and waves. Some hardcore researchers topped their experience of heat exchange between mediums of different temperatures by taking a refreshing bath in the fjord – compared to the atmosphere, the ocean was warm but still below 0°C. In the poster sessions, all students presented their own projects and discussed them with both other students and lecturers.
Overall, the winter school was a perfect place to gain and exchange knowledge and connect with researchers in closely related fields.
Text: Vår Iren Hjorth Dundas and Anna-Marie Strehl