Research interests
Currently, my research focuses on the salinity evolution of first-year sea ice, the role of the evolution of frost flowers on first-year sea ice, and the interaction of first-year sea ice with its adjacent layers ocean and atmosphere within the changing climate system.
Since a lot of our current knowledge about sea ice relies on measurements that were carried out on and in multi-year sea ice (and this sea-ice type currently is replaced by first-year sea ice), I do field and lab experiments on the evolution of first-year sea ice and its interaction with the ocean and the atmosphere.
As part of my Doctoral thesis, I'm working on the following topics:
- Salinity evolution of sea ice
- Ocean-ice-atmosphere interactions
- Frost flowers on sea ice
During a winter-long field experiment, which we carried out in a small Greenlandic bay close to the North-Western coast from November 2009 until June 2010, we measured the temperature evolution above and below growing and melting thin, first-year sea ice. During a period of a few days in March 2010, I additionally did a study on the temperature and salinity evolution of frost flowers, which grew on sampling holes we cut into the already existing sea ice.
Unfortunately, the first point (which I spent the most time on during my thesis) turned out to be very complicated. Together with René Fontes (a former member of our group) we developed a new instrument that should be capable to measure the salinity evolution of sea ice in situ by measuring the impedance between two thin bare metallic wires. Therefore, I did several preliminary tests to determine working frequencies, voltages, distances between the wires, and so forth. Finally, due to problems with the electronic circuit, it didn't work reliable both in the field and the lab.
Last update: 04/15/2012