CR
Cryospheric Sciences

Cryo Adventures

Memories from the Field – The Vastness of the Greenland Ice Sheet

March 16, 2026
Below a clear blue sky, ridges of ice undulate towards the horizon in stripes of white, blue, and black.
A view on the Greenland Ice Sheet close to Kangerlussuaq [Credit: Mirjam Paasch - July 2025].

I remember the day very well. It was the first time we drove up to the glacial ice from our base station in Kangerlussuaq (Western Greenland), where we had patiently been waiting for two days for the  weather to clear.  I took this photo during a three-week fieldwork campaign in July of 2025 as part of the Deep Purple project. As part of the project, we were in the field to collect glacial ice-alg ...[Read More]

Cryo Adventures – Discovering the beauty of polar winter

September 12, 2025
Cryo Adventures – Discovering the beauty of polar winter
Fig. 1: Digging snow pits, taking ice cores, and watching out for polar bears – a cold day in February on a glacier in Svalbard. [Credit: Wenceslas Marie-Sainte]

Only one month after starting my PhD, I found myself in a tiny plane flying over one of the most beautiful and breathtaking landscapes I’ve ever seen. I was on the way to the northernmost settlement in the world – the research village Ny-Ålesund. What I expected from the trip: cold temperatures, darkness, and lots of snow. What I found instead: stunning views, magical colors, friendly people, and ...[Read More]

The Proglacial Puzzle: Sampling of Glacier-fed Lakes in Greenland

July 11, 2025
The Proglacial Puzzle: Sampling of Glacier-fed Lakes in Greenland
Figure 1: Sampling on top of a frozen proglacial lake - April 2025, 67° 7′ 46.95″ N, 50° 6′ 41.21″ W . Photo: Joost van Genuchten

Would you like to follow the endeavours of a small team working in the ice-marginal terrain in South-West Greenland? They set out to investigate proglacial lakes using sediment coring, water sampling and gas collections (figure 1), aiming to better understand methane dynamics, proglacial terrain development and the environmental drivers behind methane production in glacially influenced lake system ...[Read More]

A Scientific Quest from Australia to Antarctica

May 29, 2025
A group of 10 individuals forming the team for the fieldwork
Our joint team in Antarctica [Credit: Braydon Moloney, Northern Pictures].

In this week’s blog, Levan Tielidze tells us about his participation in a scientific expedition to Dronning Maud Land, Antarctica, during the 2024–2025 field season. The journey, commencing in Australia and passing through South Africa, led him to the “surreal” and “awe-inspiring” Antarctic landscape. The team, a collaborative effort from Monash University, and the Un ...[Read More]

Field notes from the Chhota Shigri Glacier: A journey of science and survival in the Himalaya

January 10, 2025
Weather station on the snow
Figure 1: First-ever automatic weather station installed in the accumulation zone at 5218 m a.s.l. on the Chhota Shigri Glacier (Credit: Himanshu Kaushik).

I’m Himanshu Kaushik, a PhD student working under the guidance of Dr. Mohd Farooq Azam at the Indian Institute of Technology Indore (India). Seven years ago, I took my first steps onto the Chhota Shigri Glacier (CSG) in the Indian (Western) Himalaya, and it felt like stepping into another world. Surrounded by the towering peaks, it seemed otherworldly and humbling. After that first expeditio ...[Read More]

Crossing borders – Glacier fieldwork at Sulitjelma/Salajekna

November 22, 2024
Crossing borders – Glacier fieldwork at Sulitjelma/Salajekna
Postdoc Sarah Tingey filtering samples from the portal of Sulitjelma all wrapped up to avoid the chilling katabatic winds from the glacier. [Credit: Silje Waaler]

The time I first set foot at the university, I didn’t expect that two weeks later I would be looking at a backpack more than half my size, turning my back to the shelter of our rental car and walking almost 100 km in the Norwegian Arctic. Howling winds, heavy backpacks, daunting bridges, and endless beauty – that’s how I would describe my first experience with glacier fieldwork. I, Silje Waa ...[Read More]

A First-Timer’s Journey to the Heart of the Himalayas

October 25, 2024
The route of our journey from Srinagar to Panikhar.
The route of our journey from Srinagar to Panikhar. The black line is the road we took for the car journey. The road is not to scale! (Credit: Krishnanand J)

I am Krishnanand J, a graduate student in glaciology from IISER Pune, India. This is a story about my very first field trip to the Himalaya. Coming from a small village in Kerala, which is the southernmost state of India, going to the Himalaya is considered a big thing. It is like a camel visiting Antarctica. So below, I will take you along on an immersive journey, as I tell you about my first fie ...[Read More]

Dreaming & reading about fieldwork – summer blog break 2024

July 29, 2024
A person is kneeling down at a brown pond, all covered in mosquito net, waterproof gear, kitchen gloves and a pancake flipping spatula.
Maria during an Arctic Microbiomes PhD Summer school in Nunavut, Canada. Yes, sometimes, kitchen utensils help you stay away from mosquitos and discover some amazing bacterial mats (you can find them in your non-Arctic ponds, as well! (Photo Credit: Pascal Paradis)

  As we are starting into our annual blog summer break, we reflect on what summer can mean for polar researchers (including some fieldwork saudades). As an Arctic or Alpine cryo-scientist, chances are that you are somewhere in between vacation, fieldwork or trying to work through data while everyone else is free. If you, like us, did not have your vacation yet or do not have any fieldwork com ...[Read More]

The joy of collecting snow meltwater: a problem-solving hunt for meltwater in Northern Finland

April 5, 2024
The joy of collecting snow meltwater: a problem-solving hunt for meltwater in Northern Finland
Figure 1: Pallas Catchment, Finland. [Credits: Charlotte Ditlevsen]

We know that climate change is affecting many aspects of what we have considered “stable” throughout a long period of modern times. One of many impacted and changing factors is snow and thereby also snow meltwater. One way to study meltwater is to trace it by the usage of stable water isotope signals and we plan to use it by asking: Are we underestimating the portions of snow meltwater in differen ...[Read More]

UndercoverEisAgenten – Permafrost, drones and young explorers investigating Arctic change

November 24, 2023
UndercoverEisAgenten – Permafrost, drones and young explorers investigating Arctic change
Figure 1: Aerial view of Aklavik Northwest Territories Canada: A serene grid-patterned settlement nestled by the Peel channel of the Mackenzie River, surrounded by autumnal wilderness. [Credit: Christian Thiel]

The “UndercoverEisAgenten” project takes us on a drone journey over the ever-changing permafrost landscapes. Initiated by the Alfred Wegener Institute (AWI) for Polar and Marine Research, the German Aerospace Center’s (DLR) Institute of Data Science, and the Heidelberg Institute for Geoinformation Technology (HeiGIT), this venture is about more than just capturing images. It̵ ...[Read More]