Healy to carry Arctic research team

A team of researchers will travel to the Arctic Ocean on the U.S. Coast Guard icebreaker Healy this year, to collect data on the geochemistry of the region. According to the Florida International University, Dr. David Kadko from the university will lead the expedition, the purpose of which will be to study how the carbon budget, geochemical cycles and ecosystems in the Arctic respond to rapidly changing climate conditions. The expedition is part of the Geotraces program, an international research program with a mission of identifying the processes and parameters that control the distribution of key trace elements and isotopes in the ocean, and to establish the sensitivity of these distributions to changing environmental conditions.

“The international program will be unprecedented in regional scope and scientific breadth,” Florida International University says. “This marks the first time that grand-scale, coordinated geochemical measurements will be performed in the Arctic Ocean.”

According the U.S. Coast Guard the expedition will last from Aug. 7 to Oct. 12, with the Healy sailing to the North Pole.

- Alan Bailey