Arctic and Antarctic climate change

Research focus

The observational basis and prognostic capabilities — ranging from weather forecasts via climate predictions to climate projections — are continuously improved by dedicated fieldwork providing new data and direct process understanding.

Present research priorities include:

• Antarctic ice shelves.
• field work in the ice-covered Arctic.
• the “seamless” extension of the instrumental record with high-resolution paleo reconstructions.
• disentangling oceanic and atmospheric influences on sea ice conditions (and vice versa).
• the routing of freshwater, and polar weather and climate prediction, including predictability over land.
• the general challenge of understanding the role of the polar regions in global climate.