BBC NEWS | Science/Nature | Major two-year polar study begins

BBC NEWS | Science/Nature | Major two-year polar study begins: "Major two-year polar study begins
By Matt McGrath
Environment reporter, BBC News

Sun shining on ice in the Arctic (Image: AP)
Scientists warn Arctic summer sea ice could disappear by 2040
One of the world's biggest research programmes of the past 50 years has been launched in Paris.

International Polar Year (IPY) is a $1.5bn (£763m) collaborative effort to study the north and south poles.

Thousands of researchers will be carrying out more than 200 projects, with climate change top of the agenda.

Some nations, including the UK and US, unveiled their IPY programmes earlier this week, but the Paris event sees the official start of the two-year study.

This is the fourth IPY since 1882 but the first one in which the impact of man-made global warming will be clearly visible at both poles.

Ice sheet melt

Using ice breaking ships, satellites and submarines, an army of researchers from more than 60 countries will be studying the polar regions in unprecedented detail over the next two years.

And climate change will be at the heart of many of the research projects.

Scientists say rising temperatures are warming the polar regions faster than the rest of the planet.

One of the key questions that scientists will hope the research effort will shed new light on i"