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We are celebrating the 150 year anniversary for Vilhelm Bjerknes both the 14. March  and the 19. March. Monday 19 we are happy to announce a guest lecture by Professor Sir Brian Hoskins, Grantham Institute of Climate Change and the University of Reading.
 

The dominating exchange of carbon in the Nordic Seas takes place across the Greenland-Scotland Ridge. Horizontal transport of carbon in the region is almost two orders of magnitude larger than the uptake from the atmosphere in the Nordic Seas.

Delegates from St.Petersburg and Kaliningrad visited Bergen and the BCCR to gather Nordic experience in climate- and energy planning.

In a new study published in Ocean Science, Bjerknes Centre scientist Anders Sirevaag and co-authors present results from a 16 day long drift experiment in the central Arctic Ocean in 2008. Compared to the early 1990’s, the measurements from 2008 show that the upper central Arctic contained more freshwater in the summer, but was saltier during winter. This indicates that there has been a transition towards a more seasonal Arctic ice cover, which means that more ice is forming during winter and melting during summer.

A recently published study from the University of Bergen and the Bjerknes Centre indicates that an increase in the strength of the cold northerly winds may increase the transport of warm Atlantic water into the northern sea, and consequently a reduced Arctic sea ice cover.

While the Bjerknes Centre traditionally has had its main research concentration in the northern regions, the research area also is now expanding to Asia. BCCR has collaboration with institutions in Bangladesh, India, China and Thailand.

Past environmental conditions can be inferred from fossil pollen and other microfossil assemblages. A new study allows these reconstructions, which provide important evidence for interpreting past climatic conditions, to be assessed statistically.

2010 has in many ways been a year in transition for the Bjerknes Centre, writes the Centre’s diretor Eystein Jansen in the fresh Annual Report for 2010.

An expansive megadrought that parched ancient Africa and southern Asia about 16,000 years ago was one of the most intense and far-reaching dry periods in the history of modern humans.

During the period AD 1650-1760, farmers living in Nordfjord were repeatedly forced to apply for tax reductions following damage to farms and farmland caused by snow-avalanches. A new study from the Bjerknes Centre indicates that this period featured the highest snow-avalanche frequency of the last 7000 years.

In a recent study published in Climate of the Past, Carin Andersson and co-workers at the Bjerknes Centre focus on the conflicting trends in reconstructed surface ocean temperatures for the North Atlantic and Norwegian Sea since the last ice age.

Upper ocean properties in the Southeast Pacific show rapid changes with high amplitudes on decadal to centennial time scales. This variability may be linked to the tropical ocean and climate via an intermediate depth “ocean tunnel”.

Grease ice is not described by the climate models, but may play a central role in Arctic sea ice production in the future. A new publication describes grease ice measurements from Svalbard, and predicts the grease ice thickness based on wind and current forcing.