Arctic Floating University: 13 years of Exploration and Discoveries

Getting to the archipelagos of Novaya Zemlya or Franz Josef Land is not easy even for venerable scientists. You can’t just buy a plane ticket or a boat ticket. All the more valuable is the opportunity offered to new researchers by the unique scientific and educational program «Arctic Floating University» (AFU), which has been implemented for many years with the support of the Russian Geographical Society. In 2023, the project won the Crystal Compass Award in the «Travel and Expeditions» category.

Every summer, starting in 2012, a ship leaves Arkhangelsk, from which sea and land surveys are conducted for about a month. Unlike purely scientific expeditions, the AFU has a special feature: students and graduate students from different parts of Russia, for whom the Arctic is already a subject of scientific interest, go on a voyage together with experienced scientists.

The initiative to organize the Arctic Floating University belongs to the Northern (Arctic) Federal University named after M. V. Lomonosov (NArFU) and the Roshydromet. The partners, primarily the Russian Geographical Society, provide support by allocating funds in the form of grants. Recently, the AFU has been included in the All-Russian program of the Ministry of Education and Science of the Russian Federation which is called «Floating University». It includes similar scientific and educational projects in other regions.

The key areas of the AFU’s work are related to the study of the hydrometeorological regime of the Arctic Ocean seas, microbiological studies of the Arctic and Subarctic, environmental monitoring in the areas of active economic activity in marine and coastal zones, research on the biodiversity of Arctic ecosystems, and the study of human adaptation to the conditions of the high-latitude Arctic.

Expeditions usually take place on board the scientific research vessel «Professor Molchanov» (in some cases, the more powerful «Mikhail Somov» was used). A typical research area is the northeastern part of the Barents Sea, the northwest of the Kara Sea, and the archipelagos of Novaya Zemlya and Franz Josef Land. Although there are exceptions, and the itinerary includes, for example, Svalbard and even Taimyr.

The total composition of the expedition, not counting the crew members, averages 50–55 people, of which about half of the places are reserved for young researchers. Almost any student or graduate student of a Russian university in one of the relevant majors can become a participant. Yes, it’s difficult. For example, this year 28 lucky people were selected from thousands of applicants. It is necessary to go through several selection cycles, formulate a promising topic, choose a science advisor, convince the selection committee that interest in Arctic exploration is not accidental, and have basic training — after all, we are talking about a real expedition, and even though it takes place in summer, sometimes the conditions are rather harsh.

Young scientists shared their impressions with the RGS website after the expedition season in 2022. For example, this is what Ekaterina Vorotnichenko, a student at Russian State Hydrometeorological University who studied the pollution of the coasts of the Novaya Zemlya archipelago by marine debris, told us:

«The expedition exceeded all my expectations. We visited incredibly beautiful places, visited places where no human had set foot this year, saw polar bears, walruses, whales, and unusual birds. The Arctic is an incredible region. In three weeks, I gained a lot of knowledge, found many new friends and colleagues with whom I will continue to write articles and participate in conferences.»

Aleksandr Saburov emphasizes that the young researchers perform a full-fledged scientific function during the expedition, albeit an auxiliary one. And the result should be a scientific report.

«It is important that a student or graduate student has completed the entire cycle of preparing a scientific product: from research planning to scientific publication and validation of the results,» emphasizes the head of the expedition.

As for advisors, they are usually interested in their own «educational mission», since today many scientific institutes and universities feel a certain lack of well-trained young specialists. Getting an assistant and, possibly, a future colleague, who proved themselves in an expedition, is not bad at all.

In over the 13 years of the AFU’s work, about 250 scientific articles have been published in academic journals. Such a high number is explained by the fact that the Arctic is still a little-studied region of the planet. Besides, there are constant changes in nature. You can most often hear about climatic changes, and they are indeed observed in the Arctic. The anthropogenic impact is also clearly visible, primarily in the form of garbage.

«Scientists from the Russian State Hydrometeorological University, led by Aleksandra Ershova, have recorded a very high density of marine pollution and its accumulation on the northern coast of Novaya Zemlya, where it is carried by currents,» says Aleksandr Saburov. «It’s mostly plastic. It gets into the sea from cargo and fishing vessels.»

Atlantic currents run along the Scandinavian Peninsula and then along the western coast of Novaya Zemlya from north to south. Thus, if a plastic bottle is dropped from a ship off the coast of Scandinavia, after a while it ends up in the Barents Sea.

«Garbage is probably the most serious environmental problem we have faced. And its presence may even be a little shocking, given the fact that you don’t expect to see ordinary household garbage here. On one 100-meter-long stretch of beach, our colleagues counted 675 objects of various sizes, mostly made of plastic. However, with all this, the overall environmental situation in the Arctic can be called more or less optimal,» the expedition leader notes.

Interesting data has been obtained by scientists studying the biodiversity of the Arctic. Long-term ornithological observations, including those carried out during the AFU expeditions, confirm the penetration of southern species into the biome of the Arctic deserts. This correlates with the warming in this area, which has traditionally been considered extreme for living organisms. During an expedition in 2022, Irina Pokrovskaya, an employee at the Institute of Geography of the RAS, recorded a visitation of a barn swallow, a southern species, to Cape Zhelaniya for the first time in the 21st century. And along the northern border of Novaya Zemlya, scientists recorded the presence of barnacle geese, who also shifted their nesting area to the north.

If the appearance of birds, deer, and even butterflies atypical for this territory can be explained by a peculiar climatic migration, then the bumblebee discovered during the expedition in 2015 by NArFU student Vitaly Spitsyn is a completely different case. In a sense, this is a discovery.

«We are talking about an unusual species, the so-called glacial bumblebee, ” continues Aleksandr Saburov. "The species itself is well-known, but it has not been found on Novaya Zemlya before, and this allows us to conclude that there was some kind of territory in the archipelago during the ice Age that was not covered with ice and life continued there. This assumption is confirmed by the results of genomic analysis."

The endolithic systems discovered by scientists at the Institute of Geography of the RAS in the very north of Novaya Zemlya indicate how diverse life forms can be and in what inconceivable for the average person conditions they can appear. Endoliths are organisms that live inside rocks.

«This discovery gives us additional insights into how life could develop in extreme conditions and how it can develop in general,» explains Aleksandr Saburov.

During the expeditions, not only natural phenomena became the subject of study, but also the participants themselves. It must be said, man is also a part of nature, and it is interesting to observe the effect that a multi-day expedition has on people’s psychology in conditions that change literally in a matter of minutes. But it is also of practical importance for the formation of the composition of long-term expeditions. In particular, psychologists from NArFU have confirmed that the best psychotype for an expedition participant is a person with moderate introversion, as well as a high level of openness and activity.

The listed discoveries and finds are a kind of «crème de la crème ". However, the "milk" is also important for science, that is, systematic observations from year to year, which is why long-term expeditions of the floating university along approximately the same route are valuable. They can provide insights into the dynamics of ongoing processes, and this is sometimes even more important than high-profile discoveries. In addition, the data accumulated today will undoubtedly become the basis for future research.

Aleksandr Saburov identified three promising focus areas that could be implemented on board of the AFU.

Firstly, in the light of discussions about import substitution, the AFU could act as a kind of testing ground for new types of scientific equipment, from probes and buoys to aerial and underwater drones. By the way, in 2023, a remote-controlled underwater vehicle was tested during an expedition. It was designed by students from NArFU’s shipbuilding branch in Severodvinsk. And it did very well. It seems promising to use UAVs and artificial intelligence, for example, to monitor coastal garbage pollution.

«In a few hours of being on land, a group of people can 'manually’ calculate the amount of garbage in a limited area of a landfill of hundreds of meters, and a drone can fly over several kilometers of the coast during the same time, and recognition technologies are able to give the exact number of objects on the ground,» the expedition leader notes. «We are looking for people who could adapt technologies to the needs of scientists.»

Secondly, it is important to expand the geography of research. Scientists are particularly interested in the island Arctic. The scientists with extensive experience in polar research note the relevance of environmental and biological research here. But much depends on the availability of vessels with special capabilities.

«We can safely go to the Barents Sea in the middle of June, but the Kara Sea is still almost completely covered with ice at this time. It clears only, in the best case scenario, in the middle, or even in the end of July, » says Aleksandr Saburov.

And thirdly, the potential prospect of future AFU work may be related to the study of the seemingly close and explored White Sea.

«Despite the fact that it is located nearby and the biological station of Moscow State University and other scientific institutions operate here, the water masses of the main part of the White Sea have not been subjected to systematic regular studies for a long time,» notes Aleksandr Saburov. «In 2023, this was done literally for the first time in 100 years after the so-called Deryugin Survey (named after the famous scientist of the early twentieth century Konstantin Deryugin). And regular studies that would record various parameters of ecosystems in the White Sea, I think, would be very relevant here. This is the historical sea of our country, we must understand what is happening here. Especially since a large number of people live on the White Sea shores, and large industrial centers such as Arkhangelsk and Severodvinsk are located here.

Preparations are currently underway for the next AFU expedition, which is scheduled to take place from July 9 to August 1 on the ship «Professor Molchanov». The expedition will carry out marine work in the northeastern part of the Barents Sea, as well as land surveys on Novaya Zemlya and Franz Josef Land, where Russian Arctic National Park is located. 56 people will take part in the voyage, including 28 students and postgraduates representing 16 scientific and academic institutions and organizations from all over Russia.

Aivar Valeev