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Melting mountain glaciers all around our world are poster children for present-day climate change. But how do climate scientists monitor glaciers ? By doing fieldwork! They go up there after winter to measure how much snow was falling onto the glacier surface (aka accumulation, a positive number), and return after summer to measure how much ice was melting (aka ablation, a negative...

The Elaine P. Snowden Astronomy School is a five-day event for Year 13 students interested in studying Astronomy or Physics at university. The programme runs from 13-17 April and students will spend time at both the University of Canterbury's Ilam Campus and at Mt John Observatory in Tekapo. Applications are now open, closing 8 March. Learn more.

A new weather sensor installed by Geography technician Nick Key at Broken River weather station will expand the data available from the station as it will not only provide most of the standard weather measurements of a traditional weather station, but it is also able to differentiate different forms of precipitation and detect lightning. Both will assist with Dr...

We were flown down to the ice in a USAF ski modified Hercules aircraft (LC130), or ski-herc for short. The flight time was about 9 hours, and an hour and a half before landing we began passing over the Transantarctic Mountains!   After landing, we were driven to Scott Base and given an orientation tour, dinner, and a warm bed. The...

The He Puna Pūtaiao Programme was established by the College of Science in 2013 and is designed to give Year 10 Māori students from selected schools the opportunity to work alongside scientists and learn about scientific research. Puna means to well up or to flow, so symbolically represents youth or rangatahi. Its meaning may also incorporate research because in a...

60 Year-11 students from around New Zealand arrived at the University of Canterbury on Sunday 2 December, settling in at the Rochester and Rutherford Halls of Residence and getting to know each other that night, before kicking off the week on Monday with a tour of the campus, sessions in Antarctic Studies, Environmental Science and Psychology, fish and chips at...

University of Canterbury geography technicians Nick Key and Justin Harrison, along with Newcastle University PhD candidate Ryan Dick have been conducting a detailed bathymetric survey of Lake Wanaka as part of a joint study between Newcastle and UC. The team managed to strike the weather lucky and get six continuous days of surveying on the lake, looking to see...

Since the early days of polar exploration, public outreach has been an important duty of the few ones who could report from the icy world. Logbooks from whalers, diaries from individual expedition members and even their published work sold like hot cakes. Visitors of the polar regions thereby used the latest technology that was available to them to best describe...

There has been a small explosion in research using nutrients for the treatment of mental illness over the last decade. The general premise is that our brains need nutrients to function and chemicals that are essential for good mental health, like dopamine and serotonin, require micronutrients, like vitamins and minerals. Preliminary clinical trials are putting micronutrients and good nutrition on...

I have noticed a growing number of companies offering to measure nutrient levels and then offering a personalized treatment approach to address deficiencies identified. For example, I was asked by a member of the public what I thought of Spectral Cell Laboratories. Spectral Cell offers micronutrient testing from white blood cells (not the usual from serum or plasma). They test...