Snow on Ice brings together different science disciplines, tools and even time periods, to uncover past changes and drivers in Arctic climate. Each of our scientists is a superhero with cool tools that enable the super powers they use to uncover new scientific insights. Together they focus on ‘system science’ bringing to life new findings about past climate, that when matched to the present help us build models of the future. Educators visit our set of NGSS aligned instructional materials that focus on a main theme of ‘How do we know about the past?’ and explores the use of ‘science proxies’. Each superhero scientist has a set of activities and supports that help you bring their science story to life in your classroom in an engaging and personal way!

This National Science Foundation funded project led by the University at Buffalo, brings together experts from different institutions and scientific disciplines to explore ice sheet stability through the linked systems of ocean, ice and atmospheric conditions. The project is taking  a new look at the Arctic climate, questioning whether current warming conditions could actually stabilize the Greenland Ice Sheet if the continual reductions in Arctic sea ice were to unexpectedly change the Arctic hydrologic cycle. Paleoclimate records have shown that in the past newly exposed ocean water caused previously cold and dry Arctic air masses to warm, bringing additional moisture to the region. Could this happen again with some of the precipitation falling as additional snow? Increased snowfall on Greenland,  combined with temperatures cool enough to allow the snow to last through the summer, would cause the ice sheet to grow and begin to stabilize. This hypothesis is driving the Snow on Ice project.