international
polar
foundation

The International Polar Foundation was deeply saddened to hear of the fatal accident in Greenland that befell Prof. Konrad “Koni” Steffen. Prof. Steffen had been in the north of Greenland conducting field research at Swiss Camp (a meteorological research station he established in the ‘90s) when he passed away on Saturday, August 8th.

Frank Pattyn in a Belgian glaciologist and ice sheet modeller. He is the director of the Laboratoire de Glaciologie at the Université Libre de Bruxelles (ULB). Professor Pattyn has developed many ice sheet models, such as the Blatter-Pattyn model (a three-dimensional thermomechanical ice sheet model including higher-order stress gradients) and more recently the fast Elementary Thermomechanical Ice Sheet model (f.ETISh). These models simulate the behaviour of ice sheets and ice shelves, and allow for projecting future mass changes of ice sheets.

Thanks to a recent decision by the Greenland Place Names Committee, a previously unnamed glacier in Greenland now bears the name of world-renowned Swiss glaciologist Professor Konrad “Koni” Steffen.  Koni was also an Honorary Member of IPF, and served on the Baillet Latour Antarctica Fellowship Committee. Professor Steffen passed away in August 2020 while on a research mission to Swiss Camp, which is situated upstream from the Jakobshaven Glacier in Greenland.

Dr Alexander Mangold is a researcher who has been working with the Observations Department at the Royal Meteorological Institute of Belgium (KMI-IRM) since 2005. He manages the institute’s research on aerosols, UV and ozone at the Princess Elisabeth Antarctica (PEA) Research Station. He has participated in numerous scientific expeditions to the station in Antarctica.

The last projects he has been involved with include AEROCLOUD (a collaboration between KU Leuven, the Belgian Royal Meteorological Institute (KMI-IRM0 and the Royal Belgian Institute for Space Aeronomy (BIRA-IASB), CHASE (in partnership with Ghent University and the Université Libre de Bruxelles ULB)) and ACME (a collaboration between the Belgian Royal Meteorological Institute (KMI-IRM), the International Polar Foundation, and the Swiss Federal Institute for Forest Snow and Landscape Research (WSL)).

Valentina Savaglia is a PhD student supported by a FRIA/FNRS grant specialising in cyanobacterial diversity, genetics and biogeography in Antarctic regions at the Centre d’Ingénierie des Protéines (CIP, Centre for Protein Engineering), Université of Liège and the Laboratory of Protistology and Aquatic Ecology (PAE), Ghent University.

Valentina is part of the MICROBIAN project, a collaboration between Ghent University, the University of Liège, Royal Belgian Institute of Natural Sciences and the Meise Botanic Gardens, which aims to study the effects of climate change on the diversity and genetic-functional attributes of soil microbiomes in Continental Antarctica

On Thursday 7 May, Dr. Kate Winter from Northumbria University, presented the work she has been doing for the last two seasons at the Princess Elisabeth Antarctica at the European Geosciences Union General Assembly 2020, Europe’s largest annual conference for geoscientists, which was forced to move online this year due to the COVID-19 crisis.

The International Polar Foundation is saddened to hear about the passing of its longtime friend Philippe Bodson on 4 April 2020 due to complications related to COVID-19.

The 2018 Baillet Latour Antarctica Fellowship Laureate, Dr. Kate Winter of Northumbria University in the UK, spent nearly a month based at the Princess Elisabeth Antarctica in January and February 2020 to complete the second of two seasons of research for the BioFe project.

Every year the members of the BELARE team working at the Princess Elisabeth Antarctica (PEA) Station must undertake several traverses to assist with the unloading of materials and supplies arriving by ship and bring them back to the station, which is located more than 200 kilometres inland from the coast.

The International Polar Foundation’s outreach activities towards young students through educational Skype classes have always been welcomed with enthusiasm since they were started more than 10 years ago, soon after the Princess Elisabeth Antarctica was built.