Early next week, the Field Team of Empress Catherine II Saint Petersburg Mining University will depart for Cape Town, from where the research expedition vessel Akademik Fedorov will take them to Antarctica.
On the eve of the upcoming departure, the university’s Rector, Vladimir Litvinenko, met with the members of the team. In his farewell address, he outlined the pressing issues that should be addressed today within the framework of a comprehensive mining–geological study of the White Continent, and he set out the global and local goals facing the miners in the season of the 71st RAE(Russian Antarctic Expedition).
«Antarctica has always been an object of special interest. By decision of the government and the Party, scholars of the Mining University initially joined the team of researchers of the Earth's South Pole and today can recount in the smallest detail the history of its exploration. As a first-year student with technical college training and production experience, I was fortunate to take part in preparations for the work of the first large ‘landing party’ at Vostok Station. This was not about early, short-term visits, but specifically about long-term and serious work. At that time, the issue of building mobile residential infrastructure arose acutely—one that had to meet the strictest requirements in terms of weight, structure, and the possibility of rapid assembly. At all levels, we had to make extreme decisions amid a total shortage of materials and resources, as well as a lack of experience living in those climatic conditions. For example, as insulation, we had to use television packaging provided to us by the Kozitsky Radio Engineering Instrument-Making Plant. Those times are long gone. Later, a drilling rig was created, a well was drilled through the ice thickness, a subglacial lake was penetrated... However, it is very important to remember how this story developed and what efforts underlie today’s study of Antarctica», - noted Vladimir Litvinenko.
In the course of the continent’s development, numerous studies have been carried out that have yielded revolutionary scientific results. But there still remain “windows” of uncertainty that have yet to be closed.
«Eastern Antarctica is less studied in comparison to the West. In previous years, we carried out narrowly specialized work, primarily concerning the creation of new methods for breaking through the ice sheet and studying the processes that occur during its drilling. In other areas of knowledge, many questions have accumulated. What is the nature of the ice sheet on the continent and how did it form? It is obvious that it is not simply accumulated and compacted snow. How do the surrounding conditions affect the ice? How homogeneous is it, given that in different periods accumulation occurred under various conditions and with different physicochemical properties? The Americans, for their part, do not take this factor into account and conduct their studies with certain reservations.
What is happening beneath the ice? Did Lake Vostok form as a result of melting? How do thermal tectonic processes affect the White Continent? A separate subject for research is the basement of the continent—the Antarctic Platform, most of which, within the bounds of the East Antarctic coast, is an Upper Archean crystalline basement. These and other questions are the subject of heated discussion and still have not received unambiguous answers», - the head of Empress Catherine II Saint Petersburg Mining University outlined the global directions that the scientific community still has to investigate.
There are no fewer objects of interest for polar scientists at the local level as well. These include ice dynamics, the possibility of changes in heat balances, and the human impact on climate. The tasks set today for the university’s polar researchers are aimed at partially refining the ideas listed.
Any experiment must yield a result. From a geological perspective, the core sample remains the most reliable indicator of what is occurring at different levels of the Earth's subsurface. Currently, the RS-90 drilling rig, drilling tools, and auxiliary equipment are en route to Antarctica aboard the research expedition vessel "Akademik Fedorov" (with a stop in Cape Town).
The forthcoming experimental–methodological work will make it possible to work out the technology of structural core drilling of glaciers and subglacial rocks under the climatic and mining–geological conditions of Antarctica and, most importantly, to obtain unique core samples of ice and subglacial rocks.
«Despite many years of studying the White Continent, to this day we do not have direct results based on core material. The military conducted experiments, foreign countries attempted drilling, but publications with detailed composition have not appeared. Undoubtedly, these studies today are at the cutting edge of serious science. Obtaining new, refining, and supplementary results would mean extraordinary progress for theoretical analysis. Our Field Team of the Scientific Geological Party ‘Antarctica’ has been assembled for specific tasks; the team is cohesive and highly professional, which means we can count on the expected high results. The possibilities of Antarctica are inexhaustible!» - the Rector emphasized.
The work program was described in detail by Alexey Bolshunov, Head of the Field Team, and Mikhail Dvoinikov, scientific head of the "Arctic" Research Center and the chief coordinator for the scientific project "Comprehensive Geological and Geophysical Studies of the Deep Structure of East Antarctica..
