Climate Change in the Arctic Ocean: "How Eternal is the Ice?"

Climate change, its causes and consequences dominate the media and public discussions with keywords such as global warming, melting glaciers and sea ice, and rising sea levels. It is particularly and significantly pronounced in the Arctic Ocean and its sea ice cover. Arctic sea ice is a particularly critical component of the global climate system. It reacts extremely sensitively to changes and controls the heat balance of the oceans. In the absence of sea ice, less solar radiation is reflected, leading to a warming of the water. Over the past few decades, a drastic decline in Arctic sea ice cover has been observed, which is occurring significantly faster than all climate models predicted, in parallel with the global increase in CO2. Knowledge about the developments in this region is of great importance to us, as highlighted in the exciting and informative lecture by Prof. Dr. Rüdiger Stein (Alfred Wegener Institute (AWI) Helmholtz Centre for Polar and Marine Research Bremerhaven).