News
INFOMAR Supported
Research on RTE’s ‘The Investigators’
The Investigators
is a new series shown on RTE1 that examinesIreland’s
scientific contribution to the world. It covers a range of current topics
from some of the top minds in the country and examines the potential
impacts of Irish science on our lives. One of the episodes takes a look at
what scientists in
Ireland are doing to understand climate
change and features cutting edge research being undertaken by three
glacial geologists from the Marine Institute, the
University of
Ulster
and Durham
University (UK).
Glaciers are dynamic systems that are sensitive to
changes in the global climate system. The deposits left behind by glaciers
from the past ice ages can be used to tell us about the nature and timing
of major climatic events. Dr Sara Benetti from the Marine Institute, Dr
Paul Dunlop ( Ulster ) and Prof Colm Ó Cofaigh (Durham) have been analysing the high resolution
bathymetric data collected offshore northwest Ireland by
the Irish Government as part of the Irish National Seabed Survey (INSS).
From these data, they have identified the same glacial features that we
see on land, like drumlins and moraines, scattered on the continental
shelf. In August 2008 on the R.V. Celtic Explorer, they lead the
first scientific cruise off the northwest coast of Ireland to
core through these landforms and retrieved cores from waters as deep as
2.5 km. The cruise was funded by the SSTI ship time programme 2008 with
the INFOMAR Programme (co-managed by the Marine Institute and the
Geological Survey of Ireland) providing technical support and equipment.
Sediments recovered from the seabed are now being analysed by the team to
provide new detailed information about the nature and timing of glacial
cycles across the North Atlantic. The
work will provide a critical new record on climate change for the region
and new proxy data on how the Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets may respond to
global warming.
Click here to view the episode.
For more details
see http://www.theinvestigators.ie/ Call for Research Proposals
2008
The INFOMAR Call for research proposals
or collaborative value added work has now closed. The deadline for
the receipt of proposals was 31st October 2008. Succesful applicants will be notified
shortly.
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