For this project, the research team will be collecting and analyzing archaeological and paleoenvironmental data from three widely separated but environmentally comparable sites within the northern circumpolar region, the Yli-li area of Northern Finland, the Wemindji area of James Bay, Canada, and possibly in the Kamchatka Peninsula region of Russia.
Posted July 23, 2010 - 4:26pm by Michael Wing
Hi Karl:
This is Michael Wing, a PolarTREC teacher from last year. Like you, I participated in an archaeology project. You just said in your journal that the people you are studying entered a virgin continent - actually two virgin continents, and you wondered if they realized it. But surely there is evidence that people were here before the Clovis culture - Meadowcroft, Monte Verde sites etc. What does your team think about this issue? Was there really nobody here before Clovis people? Or, were there some but the arrival of Clovis people changed everything because now they could hunt large animals?
You are so lucky to be studying the Clovis people. They may have overdone it a bit on the big game hunting, but you have to admit it was a very exciting period in human history.
Posted July 20, 2010 - 10:58am by Michael Wing
OK I have another question, Claude - I notice you are very close to the coast but your archaeological sites look like they are on a bluff or hill that's a few tens of feet higher than sea level. How was sea level different when these sites were occupied? Were the sites lower and closer to the water? yours, Mike
Posted July 16, 2010 - 8:15am by Michael Wing
Dear Claude:
That's so neat that you saw an erupting volcano on one of your first days in the field! It makes me wonder, though: Your landscape is so steep and your volcanoes so active (compared to Finland and Canada, where your team also does archaeology) that why don't the ancient sites get covered up by volcanic ash? How is it that there are any left? yours, Michael Wing
Posted May 7, 2010 - 3:35pm by Michael Wing
Dear Claude:
This is Michael Wing - I went to Finland last year with Ezra's team. I envy you! It was actually while in Finland last May that Ezra learned he got the grant to go to Kamchatka. I am enjoying your posts from Fairbanks. Please let me know If there's anything I can do to help you prepare for your expedition - but, of course, I don't know much about Kamchatka. yours, Mike Wing
I am going to Namibia in April! Specifically, to the Namib Desert near Walvis Bay. I'll be there from April 18 to April 25.
Why? And what does this have to do with the polar regions? If you remember my post on this site from March 23 2009, you'll remember that deserts and the polar regions have a lot in common.
Both are extreme environments that appear hostile to life at first, but are full of hidden surprises. Both have beautiful, other-worldly landscapes, remote and empty. Both are fragile environments sensitive to climate change. And, both have hypolithic cyanobacteria.
Cyanobacteria are some of Earth's oldest, simplest and toughest microorganisms. They live in lots of places, not just in extreme environments. However, wherever conditions get really tough you find them under rocks ("hypolithic" = "under rocks.") Hypolithic cyanobacteria are best known from the Arctic (Devon and Cornwallis Islands) and the Antarctic Dry Valleys.
They prefer translucent rocks like quartz and marble. The rock acts like a little greeenhouse window, transmitting some visible light but blocking a lot of the harsh ultraviolet light that can harm living cells. The rocks also trap moisture under them, and protect the cells underneath from extremes of heat and cold.
There's a lot that isn't known about hypoliths. Their growth is difficult to quantify, since it responds to the contours of each rock. However, if you place pre-cut rocks of standardized dimensions in extreme environments, you can rigorously control for variables like light transmission, surface composition and roughness, starting inoculations, and time.
Starting this year, Sir Francis Drake High School will begin to deploy an array of artifical hypoliths in extreme locations around the world. Each array will be approximately one square meter in area and will include 60 or more stones. The stones will be glass and/or marble tiles from building supply stores. They will have a standard length, width and thickness. Variables will include:
Carbonate (marble) vs. silicate (glass),
Light transmissivity (3 levels?),
Innoculated with local cells vs. sterile when placed into the environment,
Rough (sanded) surface vs. factory smooth.
Namibia will be the first opportunity for us to do this. We also plan to do this in California's White Mountains (near the Nevada border) and Devon Island (Canadian Arctic) this year. In future years we might add the Mojave Desert, the Atacama, the Sahara, Australia, and the Antarctic Dry Valleys.
With me in Namibia will be an international crew: Dr. Chris Mckay of the NASA Ames Research Center in California, Dr. Donald Cowan of the University of the Western Cape (South Africa), Dr. Henry Sun of the Desert Research Institute (Nevada) and Dr. Charles Cockell of the Open University (United Kingdom), among others. All of these are veterans of Antarctica's Dry Valleys.
This expedition is part of NASA's Spaceward Bound Program, and most of the scientists attending have an interest in Astrobiology. Astrobiology is the study of life in extreme environments in order to understand how to find life on other planets, like Mars.
Will I post journal entries and photos from the field? Of course!
The Namib is like Antarctica, only warmer?
Posted October 16, 2009 - 4:11am by Robert Harris
Have your classes follow PolarTREC Expeditions in the Arctic and Antarctic by creating posters.
Posted September 9, 2009 - 12:58pm by Michael Wing
Cooling that happened 6,000 years ago ended prosperous living on the same latitude as Finland
Posted August 16, 2009 - 11:02am by Michael Wing
Planet Earth and everything in it is just a giant machine for turning sunlight into infra-red light!?
