Students blog from Siberia during Polaris Project

Western Washington University students Lindsey Parkinson and Miles Borgen, along with faculty member Andy Bunn, are blogging this month from remote Siberia as they study global climate change and the Arctic as part of The Polaris Project.

The project, funded by the National Science Foundation since 2008, brings a multinational group of students, teachers, and scientists to the Siberian Arctic each year to conduct cutting-edge investigations that advance scientific understanding of the changing Arctic.

Bunn, an associate professor of environmental sciences at Western's Huxley College of the Environment, is among the project's core faculty members, and he's brought Western students with him on the trip for years.

Check out Bunn's and the students' blogs, along with blogs from the many other faculty, scientists and students, on the Polaris Project's website.

Here's how the latest entry from Borgen begins:

The shock of stepping off that plane has worn off a little. The snow has melted off the top of the distant peaks and the station is buzzing with the sounds of science (and mosquitoes). The internet (or internyet) has been down for a week or so, so this post is a little dated, but bear with me.

My project, along with everyone’s, has really taken shape. What started as a side project has evolved into a pretty involved story. I’m running an experiment which seeps the organic carbon from different vegetation to determine (in so many words) bacteria’s ability to consume that organic material (the lability of the carbon). The first few days were spent out in the field tagging along with the terrestrial team and harvesting the dominant flora in both the boggy wetlands and drier uplands.