Journeys to the ice

The Galápagos of the Southern Ocean – Part II: Enderby Island

Matthew Wood • Apr 06, 2014

• Enderby Island,
• Enderby Trust,
• Heritage Expeditions,
• New Zealand Sea Lion,
• Southern Ocean,
• Yellow-eyed Penguin

Greetings, Scibloggers! Before I begin I should explain my very long hiatus in posting to Sciblogs. In early 2010 I started Journeys to the Ice, an audio podcast and blog on Antarctic science usually featuring recent research from the Antarctic Research Centre at Victoria University of Wellington. Late that year I travelled to the sub-Antarctic islands … Read More

The Galápagos of the Southern Ocean – Part I: Bon Voyage

Matthew Wood • Feb 17, 2011

• Dunedin,
• Enderby Trust,
• Heritage Expeditions,
• Krill,
• sea birds,
• Sub-Antarctic Islands

The Galápagos of the Southern Ocean is an adventure tourism cruise to the sub-Antarctic islands of New Zeland and Australia run by Christchurch-based Heritage Expeditions. The rich and diverse wildlife of the region is driven by high primary productivity at these latitudes due to upwelling along major ocean fronts. The human history of the … Read More

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Climate Change and New Zealand’s Future

Matthew Wood • Feb 02, 2011

• climate change,
• Fossil Fuels,
• New Zealand,
• policy,
• Psychology,
• science communication,
• Victoria University

ESCI 201: Climate Change and New Zealand’s Future is a Victoria University summer course which draws on the knowledge of many of Wellington’s preeminent experts in the realm of climate change. Much like the structure of the IPCC Assessment Reports, the course begins by examining the scientific basis of climate change and then explores the implications … Read More

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The Greenland Ice Sheet in a high-CO2 world

Matthew Wood • Jan 06, 2011

• Albedo,
• Carbon dioxide,
• Computer Modeling,
• emissions,
• Greenland,
• Ice Rafted Debris,
• Ice sheet

Before I introduce the latest instalment of the podcast, I’d like to take the opportunity to say a big hello and happy new year to everyone in the Sciblogs community. I hope you all enjoyed the festive season and that 2011 brings with it plenty of exciting science stories. I should also explain my absence towards the end … Read More

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New Zealand Palynology: Into the West

Matthew Wood • Nov 10, 2010

• Hokitika Canyon,
• Palynology,
• pollen,
• Sea Surface Temperatures,
• Vegetation Succession,
• West Coast

The land is fickle. Uplift and denudation can make paleoclimate science on land difficult in some cases and impossible in others. Oh, to think of all the beautiful terrestrial climate records that have been lost to the sands (or silts or clays) of time! Much more reliable is the ocean, where change is measured not in years or … Read More

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New Zealand Palynology: Look to the East

Matthew Wood • Nov 02, 2010

• Dinoflagellates,
• JOIDES Resolution,
• Palynology,
• Quaternary,
• Transfer Functions

When you take a sample of sediment from the seafloor and remove all the carbonate and silica — nearly the whole sample in most cases — what are you left with? Palynomorphs are organic microfossils that include the pollen and spores of terrestrial plants, the cellulose remains of marine phytoplankton called dinoflagellates, … Read More

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Marsden grant takes microbiology to the extreme

Matthew Wood • Sep 27, 2010

• genetics,
• Marsden Fund,
• McMurdo Dry Valleys,
• microbiology,
• The University of Waikato

Dr. Charles Lee is a FRST Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the Department of Biological Sciences at The University of Waikato. His research into the microbial ecology of extreme environments received a significant financial boost on Friday when the 2010 Marsden Fund grants were announced. The Fast-Start grant will support new research into … Read More

The Snows of Ruapehu

Matthew Wood • Sep 13, 2010

• climate change,
• El Niño–Southern Oscillation,
• End of Summer Snowlines,
• glaciology,
• Mass balance,
• Mount Ruapehu,
• Whangaehu Glacier

Mount Ruapehu could be viewed as New Zealand’s Kilimanjaro: the upper slopes of its formidable volcanic mass tower above the plain below, hosting glaciers that, considering the surrounding desert climes, have only the most tenuous claim to existence. As is the case with its Tanzanian counterpart — vividly documented in the 2006’s An Inconvenient Truth — Ruapehu’s glaciers … Read More

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Reflections of a Sound

Matthew Wood • Aug 25, 2010

• ANDRILL,
• Black Mountain Seismic,
• ice sheets,
• McMurdo Ice Shelf,
• Ross Island Volcanics,
• Seismic reflection

When you’re spending US$15M to drill a hole, you want to make sure it’s in the right place. In the austral summer of ’05/’06, it was still a year until bits would start chewing through rock beneath the McMurdo Ice Shelf (MIS) in the first phase of the ANtarctic DRILLing (ANDRILL) Project. The international … Read More

The Story Is in the Soil

Matthew Wood • Aug 03, 2010

• Beryllium,
• Hart Ash,
• McMurdo Dry Valleys,
• Paleosol,
• Pliocene

Much of the research previously showcased on Journeys to the Ice required highly complex fieldwork systems: oceanographic research vessels and drilling rigs can be stunningly expensive to operate, and may require months of concerted, 24-hour effort by legions of scientists and support staff. The science in this episode of the podcast harks back to the old … Read More