Out in the Cold: Antarctica Expedition to Yield Scientific Data

At the bottom of the earth sits Antarctica, a land mass 98% covered in ice a mile or more thick. While this vast isolate is an unlikely vacation destination, it is ripe with potential for scientific experimentation.

Which is what an expedition team called The Coldest Journey is in the process of doing—and making history as the first to traverse the 2,000 miles of Antarctica in winter. Until now, the furthest winter journey on the continent covered
60 miles. The six-member team began with adventurer Sir Ranulph Fiennes along with a doctor and four other members, with the goal of spending mid-March through September traversing the coldest and windiest continent. The lowest temperature recorded on earth was logged at its Southern Geomagnetic Pole at -89.2°C
(-128.5°F)

“There is no past history of winter travel in Antarctica apart from the 60-mile journey. So we are into the unknown,” said Fiennes in a report from The Telegraph in the UK.¹

The Ice Team for Science, Education, Adventure, and Charity

While achieving the previously unachievable is certainly enticing, the endeavor has substantial objectives as well, including collecting scientific data that may have future implications for understanding climate change, human endurance, and the diversity of psychrophilic bacteria. As the team gathers data on the expedition, their efforts will be simultaneously raising funds for the Seeing is Believing global charity, which tackles avoidable blindness.

“As well as raising awareness and vital funds for our chosen charity, Seeing is Believing, this is a unique opportunity to carry out a number of scientific tasks in the extreme polar environment, which will make a significant contribution to our understanding of the true effects of global warming on the Antarctic continent,” said Fiennes.

From Climate Change to Hypoxia-Induced Effects on Visual Processing

The science data the team is pursuing spans from environmental to biotechnology. To determine the surface shape of the Antarctic Ice Sheet, and perhaps generate information about climate changes, the team’s transportable caboose includes GPS receivers and range sensors. To map the distribution of bacteria across the continent, the team is collecting samples of the cold-loving species for conservation and biotechnological research. A pair of research efforts targets highly sensitive isotopic analyses of water culled from surface snow. The samples may correlate indirectly to larger scale moisture transportation and surface temperature changes on the continent. This in turn contributes to models projecting climate change.

Team members themselves become specimens as the physiological and psychological effects of the hostile environment are tracked and analyzed. With acute, intermittent exposure to extreme cold, loss of the day/night cycle, low oxygen levels, and the pressures of group dynamics intensifying their experience, physiological and psychological changes within team members will be studied. Each underwent a full physiological characterization before the traverse and will repeat the exercise after it.

“The isolation is real because there is no opportunity for evacuation during the Antarctic winter, “ said Dr. Mike Stroud, BsC, MD, DSci, Expedition Medical Adviser and Human Science Research Lead. “With three to four months of complete darkness, we can assess measurable changes in circadian rhythm. Some team members will spend many hours on most days looking into darkness and all members will be subject to a degree of chronic hypoxia. This is expected to have effects on visual processing.”

The Coldest Journey members seek to engage school-age children in following their progress and learning more about the environmental sciences, history, geography, biology, and physics. To this end, Microsoft® has developed a custom password-protected platform accessible to more than 43,000 schools in the UK and many more throughout the Commonwealth. Students can use integrated curriculum modules developed by the Durham Education and Development Service in collaboration with the expedition scientists, engineers, mechanics, crew, and training officers.

The Rigors of Conquering the Last Great Polar Challenge

Rob Lambert, team doctor, told The Westmorland Gazette in December, “I’ve just got back from a year in Antarctica where I was a doctor at a British Antarctic Survey base. However, the conditions and temperatures which we will experience on this expedition will be quite unlike the ones I encountered there.”²

The added challenges are plenty. The journey from Crown Bay, Dronning Maud Land, Antarctica, to Captain Scott's base at McMurdo Sound, via the South Pole, will take six months, mostly in complete darkness. Two Caterpillar® D6N track-type tractors will pull two specially converted and sledge-mounted shipping containers or cabooses which will house the Ice Team and science equipment along with all of their fuel, food, and additional equipment. Early on in the journey, Sir Ranulph Fiennes, who began the expedition entirely on skis, accompanied by alternate members of the Ice Team, suffered frostbite and had to exit while he could, leaving the team with five members. The Ski Team, which will travel ahead of the D6Ns, will drag a ground-penetrating radar to identify the lethal perils of chasms and crevasse fields.

Because of the harsh conditions, the Foreign & Commonwealth Office in the UK has never before granted a permit for a winter expedition in Antarctica. The Coldest Journey team had to prove that it met stringent environmental and planning criteria.

See the Shuttle™ Portable Ultra-Low Temperature Freezer the team brought with them to store samples.

¹The Telegraph, Retrieved from http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/antarctica/9784490/Sir-Ranulph-Fiennes-to-attempt-first-Antarctic-winter-crossing.html on February 15, 2013.

²Upton, Hannah. “Eden Doctor Takes on Ice Trek with Sir Ranulph Fiennes,” The Westmorland Gazette. Retrieved from http://www.thewestmorlandgazette.co.uk/news/10128992.print/ on February 18, 2013.

Photo credit for penguin picture: Dr. Paul Ponganis, National Science Foundation