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January/February 2010 issue	In this issue Table of Contents IPY: What is IPY? IPY: Kluane research station IPY: Inuit health IPY: Arctic mercury mystery IPY: Arctic scientist IPY: Future Arctic research IPY: Multimedia The Inside Story Editor’s Notebook Reverberations À la carte Mosaic Book Reviews

Many scientists question whether they shouldencourage students to take up Arctic research.
Photo: Janice Lang, PCSP/NRCan

• PHOTO ESSAY
• VIDEO
• INTERACTIVE

Tools of the trade: See the unique tools Arctic scientists use in the field

Ice research: An insider’s look at Arctic ice research, part 1 and part 2

IPY by the Numbers: Learn more about Canada’s Arctic IPY projects

Having spent the better part of 30 years working with scientists in field camps, on icebreakers, on sea ice and on glaciers throughout the Arctic, usually as a journalist, sometimes as a participant, I have often asked myself the same question. I have written about it in this magazine, in several newspapers and in a commentary for Arctic, the journal of the Arctic Institute of North America. The fragmented, underfunded approach to Arctic science that became the norm in the 1990s, as leading researchers repeatedly warned, left scientists without a voice in shaping public policy on climate change, sovereignty, security and environmental and cultural integrity in a rapidly developing Arctic world.

Since that embarrassing low point, significant progress has been made in reinstituting funding to northern science, by way of several singular events. In 2003, the Coast Guard icebreaker Sir John Franklin, retrofitted and renamed the Amundsen, was turned over to a team of international scientists led by Université Laval’s Louis Fortier and University of Manitoba’s David Barber. It has since served as a floating lab on the Arctic Ocean. ArcticNet, based at Université Laval in Quebec, enables scientists and managers to collaborate with partners from government agencies, Inuit organizations and northern communities, as well as with foreign researchers. The Canadian Coast Guard itself now plays an increasingly important role in supporting these scientists, including geographer Barber and oceanographers Fortier and Eddy Carmack of Fisheries and Oceans Canada’s Institute of Ocean Sciences. All are heading up groundbreaking research in the Arctic Ocean.

Also in the works are plans for a new Arctic research station in Nunavut, either at Cambridge Bay, Pond Inlet or Resolute. And through an $85 million Arctic Research Infrastructure Fund, part of the federal Economic Action Plan, the research stations at Kluane, Churchill, Inuvik and elsewhere are getting overdue fix-ups.

The biggest financial breakthrough came in 2007, with the arrival of International Polar Year (IPY). This collaborative worldwide research effort, first staged in 1882-83 and repeated in 1932-33 and 1957-58, has made Canada a bona fide leader in Arctic science investment for the first time. The Canadian government allocated more than $150 million for IPY research projects and outreach programs. Canada’s contribution — among the top five of the 62 participating countries — continues to foster international co-operation in the Arctic and has set the stage for observational networks and ongoing science that will help policy-makers plan for the future.

IPY has also played a major role in educating southern Canadians about what is happening in the polar world, and it has made it clear to northerners — Inuit, Inuvialuit, Dene and Gwich’in — that they are, and will continue to be, partners in Arctic science. The Canadian IPY program provided scholarships for promising young Arctic scientists and technical training opportunities for Inuit and First Nations people. Now, better than ever before, we know how quickly the ice is retreating, how fast the permafrost is thawing and how climate change is affecting the well-being of northerners. And younger researchers are poised to take over the role that veterans in the field have been playing.