Arctic Research

Participation in Indian Polar Expeditions

 Collaboration with National Centre for Polar and Ocean Research

(MoES-NCPOR)

 Since 2013 School of Environmental Sciences, Mahatma Gandhi University has been associating with the National Center for Antarctic and Ocean Research (NCAOR) to carry out research at the Arctic region. Himadri, India’s arctic research station is situated at the international research station is situated at Ny Alesund which is located in a small island in the Svalbard archipelago.

All the faculties are actively involving in Arctic environmental research. Dr. Mahesh Mohan has participated 4 times in the Arctic Expedition since 2013 and he was the team leader in the year 2014. As of today,9 research scholars of the department (Gopikrishnan V.G., Bineesh M.B., Abdul Shukkur, Kannan V.M., Joice K. Joseph, John Richard Thomas, ArunBabu V, Praveen Kumar C S, Nejumal K K) has taken part in the Arctic expedition and conducted various experiments at the Indian research station Himadri. Dr. C.T. Aravindakumar, Professor of this school is a member of the committee responsible for the evaluation and selection of the projects and team members for the Arctic expedition.

The research programme involved the environmental monitoring of the Kongs fjord and Kross fjords, microbes and climate change in the arctic region. One of the major thrust areas of research programme is the mercury geochemistry in the Arctic region. Mercury being a transboundary pollutant has paved its way even to the poles. The biogeochemical cycle of mercury is highly complex and studies relating to the fate and transport of mercury in the area is quite less. Apart from this the school has now actively involved in the monitoring of emerging pollutants like microplastics, POPs etc. in this pristine ecosystem and has plans to expand its research into other relevant areas.

School of Environmental Sciences has started participating in Indian Arctic Expedition program of ESSO-National Centre for Antarctic and Ocean Research, Ministry of Earth Sciences since 2013 through a project titled “Mercury Geochemistry in the Sediments of Kongsfjorden, Ny-Alesund, Arctic” (PI: Dr. Mahesh Mohan).This project was an interuniversity collaborative program as the Co-PI is from University of Kerala (Dr. Sajinkumar KS, Department of Geology). The project was completed with two expeditions (2013-14 and 2014-15).

Members Participated

2013-14: Dr. Mahesh Mohan (August batch)

Dr. Sajinkumar KS (September batch)

2014-15: Dr. Mahesh Mohan & Mr. Gopikrishna VG (August batch)

After these initial two Arctic Expeditions, ESSO-NCAOR has identified School of Environmental Sciences, Mahatma Gandhi University as a collaboratorand Dr. Mahesh Mohan was invited for a Group discussion on future programmes during18^thNovember, 2014. The brainstorming discussions resulted in a Science plan for Arctic Environmental Research titled “Dynamics and Functioning of Arctic fjords: Regional and Global Perspectives”. We were also selected as one of the partners of the programme titled “Long – Term Monitoring of Kongsfjorden System of Arctic region for climate change studies” under this Science Plan. Dr. Mahesh Mohan has been entrusted for the Water and sediment chemistry part of the programme and he was the Team Leader for the July Batch.

Members Participated

2015-16 : Dr. Mahesh Mohan and Mr. Abdul Shukkur (July 2015)

                Mr. Gopkrishna VG and Mr. Binish MB (August 2015)

                Mr. John Richard Thomas and Mr. Kannan VM (October 2015)

In continuation with this, the School has proposed a new joint programme titled “Long Term Environmental Monitoring of Fjord Ecosystems, Ny-Ålesund”for 2016-17 expedition and has been approved by the Expert Committee.

Members participated in the 2016-17 expedition

Mr. Gopikrishna V G and Mr. Joice K Joseph (July 2016)

Dr. Mahesh Mohan and Mr. ArunBabu V. (October 2016)

This project is continued for the year 2017-18also.The members participated in this expedition are

            Mr. Gopikrishna V G (August 2017)

            Mr. Nejumal K K and Mr. Praveen Kumar C S (October 2017)

During 2018-19 

            Dr. EV Ramasamy (June -July) and Mr. Gopikrishna (June- July) participated in the Arctic expedition

Besides these expedition programmes, School of Environmental Sciences has actively participated in the Polar (Arctic and Antarctic) Environmental Research expert committees. Dr. CT Aravindakumar was an expert member of Arctic selection committee – 2015 and Antarctic Selection Committee – 2016. He was also selected as Group leader in Environmental Science, Polar science policy deduction for Ministry of Earth Science, 2016.

The linkage between School of Environmental Sciences and ESSO-NCAOR has helped Mahatma Gandhi University to excel in the Polar Research.  Both faculty and students (6 nos.) has got opportunity to participate in Arctic Expeditions. In addition, three of our Master’s Students completed their MSc. project work in NCAOR Goa in polar science.