How do today’s climatic changes differ from those of the past? Can we distinguish between changes that result from human intervention and those that occur naturally?
To find answers to these questions, and many others, a team of University of Ottawa researchers is attempting to reconstruct climatic variations of the last 12,000 years. The project is funded in part by a $265,000 grant over three years, from the Canadian Foundation for Climate and Atmospheric Sciences (CFCAS).
In May, four researchers headed by Konrad Gajewski of the Laboratory of Paleoclimatology and Climatology will travel to Victoria Island in the Arctic Archipelago. For three weeks they will take sediment samples from arctic lakes.
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| (Photo courtesy of Konrad Gajewski) |
After setting up camp, the researchers will dig holes in the ice. “There can be up to two metres of ice on arctic lakes in the summer,” explains Gajewski.
“Once we have drilled the hole, we insert a core, a drill stem measuring a metre long with a diameter of approximately five centimetres. The core drill goes through the ice and water until it hits bottom and sediment samples are taken. The various layers reveal organisms that help us determine temperatures from long ago.”
The three-week trip will allow the researchers to return with two or three sediment samples. Gajewski has been making his way to the Arctic Archipelago every year since 1990. Over the years, he has gathered what is probably the largest collection of such sediment samples in Canada.
At least 20 or 30 samples are needed to get a reasonable understanding of the natural variations in climate change over time in this region, Gajewski explains. It’s a colossal task: “It takes one to two years to properly analyze a single sediment sample.”
Gajewski hopes that his research in the Arctic will benefit Canada and the international scientific community and be discussed at the fourth International Polar Year conference in 2007-2008. “People need to be more aware of our polar regions because their future will have a tremendous impact on the rest of the world.”
