0 projects

SSF-Svalbard Science Forum

Unruly Ground: Knowing and Caring for Permafrost

Since the 2000s, permafrost has experienced a remarkable revival, and many are invested in preventing the deterioration of this Arctic ground. But while there is an increase in research on the impacts of permafrost degradation, we know very little about the inner workings of permafrost expertise....

Awarded: NOK 71,999

Project Period: 2024-2025

Location: Oslo

SSF-Svalbard Science Forum

PEbbles, ice and TalitroidS – checking overlooked beaches in the frame of autecology - RiS ID 12381

The project involves researchers part of both Amphipodologists group and editors for the Worls Registrer of Marine Species (WoRMS); for tighter collaboration and extension towards the ecology of sandy shores, it intends: To check for presence of talitroid amphipods on polar cobble beaches and as ...

Awarded: NOK 94,999

Project Period: 2024-2025

Location: Vestland

SSF-Svalbard Science Forum

Evaluating the maximum photosynthetic depth limit using coralline algae as a model organism, RiS ID 12351

This master’s thesis aims to better understand polar ecosystems by shedding light on the photosynthetic limitations of red coralline algae. We will use a mini remotely operated vehicle (Blueye X3) with a grabber attachment to locate and sample coralline algae from Van Mijenfjorden. We will collec...

Awarded: NOK 42,342

Project Period: 2024-2025

Location: Trøndelag - Trööndelage

SSF-Svalbard Science Forum

Active Scattering in Sea Ice for Measuring Internal Properties

Sea ice is filled with small brine pockets because the salt is rejected by the crystal lattice during the freezing process. These brine pockets have a significant influence on several aspects of sea ice, including its bearing capacity, the remote sensing of it, as well as the amount of solar ener...

Awarded: NOK 25,805

Project Period: 2024-2024

Location: Svalbard

SSF-Svalbard Science Forum

Monitoring Active Layer Thickness from Space – Creating a Validation Dataset around Ny-Ålesund, RiD ID 12361

The active layer thickness is one of the most important variables characterizing the state of permafrost, but we still lack the possibility to determine it over large areas, especially from satellites. Seasonal thawing and freezing cycles of the active layer cause the ground surface to heave in w...

Awarded: NOK 0.10 mill.

Project Period: 2024-2025

Location: Oslo

SSF-Svalbard Science Forum

Monitoring seawater CO2 release from thawing permafrost mobilized by Bayelva proglacial stream, RiS ID 11654

The Bayelva river (Kongsfjorden, Svalbard) represents a key site where to unearth the patterns of carbon release from thawing permafrost into coastal waters. For this reason on September 2023 the Institute of Polar Sciences of the National Research Council (ISP-CNR) of Italy, in the framework of ...

Awarded: NOK 0.10 mill.

Project Period: 2024-2024

Location: Troms - Romsa - Tromssa

SSF-Svalbard Science Forum

Ice-wedges as late Pleistocene winter paleoclimatic archives on Prins Karl Forland (RIS ID: 12313)

Apart from Greenland and Canadian Arctic ice-core records, late Pleistocene and Holocene paleoclimatic reconstructions in the northern latitudes are mainly based on proxies that record summer air temperatures. This seasonal bias has resulted in model-data mismatches, highlighting the need to reco...

Awarded: NOK 0.12 mill.

Project Period: 2024-2024

Location: Svalbard

SSF-Svalbard Science Forum

Comparing the thermal tipping point of the overwintering and summer Arctic Calanus copepods in response to copper pollution

One of the main threat for arctic species is ocean warming, the arctic ocean warming 4 times faster than the others, at a pace unprecedented over the last million years. Even more concerning are marine heatwaves, i.e. sudden peak in maximal temperatures, that can last several weeks and should inc...

Awarded: NOK 51,611

Project Period: 2024-2025

Location: Oslo

SSF-Svalbard Science Forum

Longterm consequences of one year of draining on biodiversity in Arctic ponds

In 2019, 19 ponds in Kongsfjorden were sampled, however, due to an extremely warm summer in 2020, 8 out of 19 completely dried out. In 2021 all ponds contained water again. We expect that due the high temperatures, increased evaporation and a deeper active layer have caused the desiccation. As cl...

Awarded: NOK 61,999

Project Period: 2024-2025

Location: Trøndelag - Trööndelage

SSF-Svalbard Science Forum

Investigation of temperature inversion and lapse rates on Beerenberg, Jan Mayen, RiS 12336

This project investigates temperature inversion and lapse rates on the flanks of the glacier-covered volcano, Beerenberg (2277 m a.s.l.), on the remote island of Jan Mayen. The high humidity often leads to cloud formation, non-linear lapse rates, and temperature inversion. However, little is know...

Awarded: NOK 76,859

Project Period: 2024-2025

Location: Vestland

SSF-Svalbard Science Forum

Invertebrate contributions to Arctic ecosystem services

The project "Invertebrate contributions to Arctic ecosystem services" will be part of a master thesis in the Climate Change Management programme at Høgskulen på Vestlandet (Western Norway University of Applied Sciences). The aim of the project is to sample the Arctic invertebrate necrobiome and i...

Awarded: NOK 62,965

Project Period: 2024-2025

Location: Vestland

SSF-Svalbard Science Forum

Long term monitoring of polar bears on Svalbard RIS-12380 (linked to RIS 2381)

Environmental conditions have changed dramatically in the Svalbard region; sea-ice is declining in extent and thickness; glacier fronts are reduced, and anthropogenic activities are increasing in intensity and extent. These changes impact polar bear habitat use and potentially their fitness throu...

Awarded: NOK 48,999

Project Period: 2024-2024

Location: Troms - Romsa - Tromssa

SSF-Svalbard Science Forum

Glacier Surface Topography Mapping for Satellite Radar Altimetry

Radar altimeter satellite missions such as CryoSat-2, Sentinel-3, and the upcoming CRISTAL are widely used for monitoring key parameters of land ice such as glacier mass balance change. The uncertainties of the data from these satellites produced over more complex ice caps and glaciers are poorly...

Awarded: NOK 50,085

Project Period: 2024-2024

Location: Svalbard

SSF-Svalbard Science Forum

Field validation of spatially predictive reindeer carrion distribution models, RiS ID 11512

Carrion is a patchy resource in ecological systems, and assessing the distribution and biomass quantity in a system is a fundamentally unanswered question. Our project has gathered spectral data in previous field campaigns in an attempt to detect reindeer carcasses in open, treeless systems by th...

Awarded: NOK 56,964

Project Period: 2024-2024

Location: Nordland - Nordlánnda

SSF-Svalbard Science Forum

The geomorphic signature of ancient ice shelves in Isfjorden, Spitsbergen, RiS ID12367

This research project aims to explore the historical presence of ice shelves along Isfjorden, Svalbard, and their impact on regional and global climate systems. It plans to investigate unexplored topographies that indicate to reveal the interaction between an ice shelf with an ice-free coast duri...

Awarded: NOK 29,805

Project Period: 2024-2024

Location: Svalbard

SSF-Svalbard Science Forum

Arctic kelp production and fate (BlueArc field sampling) RIS 12373

Over 20% of the world’s kelp forests occur along Arctic coastlines, yet shifts in the structure and ecological function of these habitats as a result of climate change are poorly understood. Kelp forests are highly productive ecosystems and are expected to contribute significantly to global carbo...

Awarded: NOK 98,999

Project Period: 2024-2025

Location: Vestland

SSF-Svalbard Science Forum

Arctic Cosmic Ray neutron Observations for large-Scale Sensing of SWE (ACROSS-SWE), RiS ID 12378

The project ACROSS-SWE aims to implement a snow calibration on a Cosmic Ray Neutron Sensor (CRNS) that is placed above the snow cover on the Arctic Archipelago of Svalbard. Up to this point the approach has never been applied to an Arctic CRNS station and will provide valuable insights into Arcti...

Awarded: NOK 0.10 mill.

Project Period: 2024-2025

Location: Oslo

SSF-Svalbard Science Forum

The effect of grubbing and heavy winter rainfall on mycorrhizal mycelium production

Mycorrhizal fungi play a crucial role for both plant nitrogen uptake and ecosystem carbon dynamics and storage. Most of the stored carbon in Arctic soils could be derived from mycorrhizal mycelium rather than from plant litter. As the Arctic carbon storage is suspected to be a crucial factor for ...

Awarded: NOK 51,999

Project Period: 2024-2024

Location: Svalbard

SSF-Svalbard Science Forum

The role of vegetation distribution on facies architectural and sequence stratigraphic development of the Palaeocene Firkanten Formation.

The study focuses on how coastal environments control or are controlled by vegetation distribution; collectively, these are particularly sensitive to climate change, with the geomorphology and position of the shoreline being closely linked with local hydrology and associated vegetation distributi...

Awarded: NOK 63,840

Project Period: 2024-2025

Location: Svalbard

SSF-Svalbard Science Forum

Who is where? - Unravelling the biodiversity of sympagic meiofauna in and around Svalbard

Sympagic (=ice) meiofauna is an indispensable part of a very complex food web in the Arctic, playing a crucial role for many ice-associated organisms and the whole Arctic ecosystem since sympagic meiofauna comprise primarily of larval stages of seafloor and open-water living animals. But Arctic s...

Awarded: NOK 50,443

Project Period: 2024-2024

Location: Svalbard

SSF-Svalbard Science Forum

Improving Snow Data Assimilation with Satellite Altimetry

Despite its vital role in modulating the energy and water balance budget, snow distributions in time and space remain poorly understood. The project aim is to improve the current snow data assimilation state-of-the-art methods by adding snow depth observations from the satellite altimeter ICESat-...

Awarded: NOK 0.11 mill.

Project Period: 2024-2024

Location: Oslo

SSF-Svalbard Science Forum

Calanus species complexity in the transitional fjord system Isfjorden: from cold Arctic to warm Atlantic climate.

The West Spitsbergen Current carries warm and salty Atlantic water (AW) northwards, and with high input of AW, more Calanus finmarchicus is transported to the Arctic. Isfjorden is strongly impacted by Atlantic inflow and is ice-free year-round, except the innermost part, Billefjorden, with a sha...

Awarded: NOK 0.11 mill.

Project Period: 2024-2025

Location: Svalbard

SSF-Svalbard Science Forum

Arctic CH4 consumption responses to future vegetation regimes, RiS ID: 11990

The Arctic tundra is currently undergoing rapid changes with thawing permafrost and changing vegetation. One of the most pronounced effects among the vegetation is a shift towards taller plant communities and higher biomass, which can lead to increased evapotranspiration and drier soils. Methane ...

Awarded: NOK 79,999

Project Period: 2024-2024

Location: Svalbard

SSF-Svalbard Science Forum

Investigation of the mercury cycle in the Arctic snowpack for model development (ris id: 12321)

The aim of this project is to investigate the processes involving mercury (Hg) at the snow-air interface in the polar regions. The dynamic exchange of Hg between the snow surface and the overlaying atmosphere in polar regions is not fully understood and not yet constrained into the one-dimensiona...

Awarded: NOK 0.11 mill.

Project Period: 2024-2025

Location: Troms - Romsa - Tromssa

SSF-Svalbard Science Forum

Hornsund’s and Storfjorden DOM Data Acquisition Campaign and Virtual Field Guide Development for Educational Research. RiS ID - 12339

This project aim to perform a systematic digitalization of eastern Spitsbergen coast, due to its excellent cretaceous sediments' exposures, and western Barentsøya-Edgeøya for their important HALIP exposures. Collecting these types of data from Hornsund’s and Storfjorden’s surroundings can provid...

Awarded: NOK 0.12 mill.

Project Period: 2024-2024

Location: Svalbard

SSF-Svalbard Science Forum

The transition from ductile to brittle deformation in pre-Devonian basement of the Billefjorden Fault Zone, Svalbard (RiS: 12317)

The Billefjorden Fault Zone (BFZ) is a N-S striking regional-scale long-lived lineament cropping out in central Spitsbergen. This lineament exposes multi-deformational evolution that initiated with ductile deformation preserved in the metamorphic basement. Following several phases of brittle def...

Awarded: NOK 0.12 mill.

Project Period: 2024-2024

Location: Svalbard

SSF-Svalbard Science Forum

DyNAflow: Colonisation dynamics of Arctic endemics across glacial landscapes

Warming in the Arctic is causing glacial retreat, which exposes deglaciated terrains to biotic colonisation. Ecological studies can provide insights into the local processes (microclimate, biotic interactions) driving the development of soil communities after glacier retreat. However, community d...

Awarded: NOK 0.10 mill.

Project Period: 2024-2024

Location: Svalbard

SSF-Svalbard Science Forum

Arctic marine mammals in a time of climate change: a Kongsfjorden Case Study. RiS ID: 11501

The fieldwork is a component of the NFR ARK (Arktisk Klima forandring Konsekvenser) project, which focuses on impacts of global warming on Arctic endemic marine mammals. The project is using a “case-study” approach based on the Kongsfjorden-Krossfjorden ecosystem, where the objective to examine h...

Awarded: NOK 89,221

Project Period: 2024-2024

Location: Troms - Romsa - Tromssa

SSF-Svalbard Science Forum

Linking past and present surge dynamics at Borebreen from drone surveys

Svalbard has a high density of surging glaciers – marine and terrestrial glaciers which undergo cyclical changes between fast (active) and slow (quiescence) flow. During the active phase, ice discharge accelerates and mass loss increases which significantly impacts glacier mass balance. However, ...

Awarded: NOK 79,999

Project Period: 2024-2024

Location: Akershus

SSF-Svalbard Science Forum

Geomorphology and process-interaction in previous and present climate as exemplified by Bjørndalen, Svalbard (RiS 12312)

This M.Sc. thesis project has a primary objective of mapping the geomorphology of Bjørndalen, Svalbard, to contribute to our understanding of this unique Arctic valley system. The research aims to characterize the long-term and short-term geomorphologic processes shaping the valley and analyze ho...

Awarded: NOK 52,672

Project Period: 2024-2024

Location: Svalbard