08 Heading for the lab

In Ny-Ålesund, everything is just a short walk away. The little village in the west of Spitsbergen is reserved for science only: Norway, Germany, France and China as well as Italy, the United Kingdom, Japan, Spain and the Netherlands operate research stations there. The inhabitants of Ny-Ålesund dedicate themselves to science. In winter, about 30 people live there, in summer up to 120.

For the 2010 mesocosm study, 35 scientists from Germany, France, the United Kingdom, Norway, Denmark and the Netherlands came to Ny-Ålesund. About a dozen members of the German research network BIOACID participated in the experiment that was conducted as part of the European Project on Ocean Acidification EPOCA.

Photo: Nick Cobbing