New possibilities for economic development have been identified by the Greenland Home Rule Government in recent years. One of these is the potential for development of biotechnology based on Greenland's biodiversity. To ensure that Greenland shares in benefits derived from the exploitation of these resources the Home Rule Parliament recently enacted legislation on commercial and research-related use of biological resources that is premised on rights recognised by the 1992 Convention on Biological Diversity. This legislation represents the first law in an Arctic jurisdiction specifically to create a mechanism for access and benefit sharing in relation to Arctic genetic resources. The main area of research and commercial interest so far relates to potential developments in biotechnology from the microbial diversity of ikaite tufa columns located in the Ikka Fjord in southwest Greenland. The legislation seeks to provide a mechanism for regulating access to such biological resources and a means for Greenland to share in the potential benefits that may come from scientific research on them and subsequent commercialisation. Much research in Greenland now falls within the scope of this legislation. The purpose of this article is to explain the provisions of the legislation to the polar research community as well as to review its implications for research in the International Polar Year and later. The legislation imposes many new obligations on researchers in Greenland including obligations to obtain survey licences, obligations on reporting and the regulation of publication of scientific research. Commercially focussed research is also tightly regulated with a particular emphasis on patent rights. However, many aspects of the legislation are uncertain and it is unclear how much of the legislation will be implemented in practice.

With the International Polar Year (IPY) having commenced in March 2007, key issues relating to the polar regions are again in focus. This article reviews one central legal issue re-emerging in the Arctic: global regulation of safety standards for international shipping. The ‘Guidelines for ships operating in Arctic ice-covered waters’ are examined, with a view to the probable expansion of shipping in the Arctic in near future. Following an introduction to navigational issues within the Arctic context, the article describes how the guidelines came into being, and then analyses key elements and structure of the regulations and shortfalls of today's arrangements. The possible relevance of the guidelines to the Antarctic is also discussed briefly. Finally, the article inquires into the key repercussions of introducing binding regulations.

This article presents the US role in the formation of the Antarctic Treaty of 1959 in relation to the era's anti-nuclear movement. The purpose is two-fold: to highlight the strategic orientation of US Antarctic policy, suggesting that it was less enlightened than it is frequently portrayed; and to highlight the influence of the anti-nuclear movement upon the treaty's inclusion of a test ban which the United States initially opposed, hoping to reserve the right to conduct nuclear tests. The treaty is depicted as a particular generalisation: one aspect of the cold war that gains significance when scrutinised in relation to another that is much better-known.

Sea ice has been, and continues to be, an integral component of life in the Inuit community of Igloolik, Nunavut. Located on an island of the same name off the northeastern coast of Melville Peninsula, extensive ice formation occurs in Fury and Hecla Strait. This creates an important travel and hunting platform, and enables access to Baffin Island, the mainland, moving ice, hunting and fishing grounds, and nearby communities. With the combined importance, dynamism, and continuous use of this frozen ocean environment, local Inuit elders and hunters have developed a detailed and nuanced understanding of sea ice conditions, freeze/thaw processes, and the influences of winds and currents on ice conditions. Working collaboratively with the community of Igloolik since February 2004, we present the results of 24 semi-directed interviews and 4 sea ice trips to provide a baseline understanding of local freezing processes (near-shore, open water, sea ice thickening, landfast ice, tidal cracks, floe edge, and moving ice), melting processes (snow melt, water accumulation and drainage, and break-up), wind influences on sea ice (wind direction and strength affecting sea ice formation and movement), and, current influences on sea ice (tidal variations and current strength affecting sea ice formation, movement, and polynya size/location). Strong emphasis is placed on Inuktitut terminology and spatial delineations of localised ice conditions and features. Therefore, this paper provides insights into local scale ice conditions and dynamics around Igloolik that are not captured in regional scale studies of Foxe Basin and/or Fury and Hecla Strait. Results have the potential to inform future research efforts on local/regional sea ice monitoring, the relationship between Inuit knowledge, language, and the environment, and addressing community interests through targeted studies.

During an early summer visit in 2000, mosses were collected from sites around Heard Island. Three species, Bryoerythrophyllum recurvirostrum (Hedw.) P.C.Chen, Philonotis cf. tenuis (Taylor) Reichardt and Syntrichia filaris (Müll.Hall) R.H. Zander have been added to the list of moss species known from the island, bringing the total to 40 moss taxa. Syntrichia anderssonii (abcngström) R.H. Zander was found with sporophytes, whereas previously its sporophytes were known in the sub-Antarctic only from Macquarie Island. Extensions of range on Heard Island have been recorded for several species. There are few geographical differences in species composition between locations around the island, provided appropriate habitats exist.

Since the exploration of Antarctica began, procedures for dealing with human wastes have changed considerably. The establishment of research stations made it necessary to provide for sewage disposal. However, the introduction of advanced wastewater treatment processes has been driven largely by an intensifying concern to protect the Antarctic environment. A key step was the adoption by Antarctic Treaty nations of the so-called Madrid Protocol, in which minimum standards for sewage treatment and disposal are prescribed. The provisions of this protocol are not particularly onerous and some countries have elected to go beyond them, and to treat Antarctic research station wastewater as they would at home. Transferring treatment technologies to Antarctica is not simple because the remoteness, isolation, weather and other local conditions impose a variety of unusual constraints on plant design. The evolution of advanced treatment plant designs is examined. Most countries have opted for biofilm-based processes, with Rotating Biological Contactors (RBC) favoured initially while more recently contact aeration systems have been preferred. Sludges are now generally repatriated, with a diversity of sludge dewatering techniques being used. The evolution of treatment process designs is expected to continue, with growing use, especially at inland stations, of sophisticated processes such as membrane technologies and thermally efficient evaporative techniques.

In October 2002, following the 11 September 2001 attacks on the United States, the Unified Command Plan (UCP), that sets out the geographical responsibilities of combatant commanders, was revised with regard to their areas of responsibility. Accompanying these changes was a map, which detailed the geographical boundaries of the US Northern, Pacific, Southern, European and Central Commands. The map indicated that two of these Commands, Southern and European Command stretched as far south as the Antarctic coastline while a third (Pacific) not only did that but also included the entire Antarctic continent. In 2007, a new Africa Command comprising the southern part of European Command, was instituted and this, too, stretched to the Antarctic coastline. This note briefly considers some of the implications that might follow from these changes to the UCP and highlights logistical patterns, search and rescue matters and the question of the demilitarisation of Antarctica.

In January 2007, MS Golden Princess, carrying 2425 passengers and a crew of approximately 1100, became the largest ship to sail Antarctic waters within the northern limit of pack ice. This note describes the ship and its itinerary, discusses aspects of the cruise, and comments on the use of large cruise liners in Antarctic waters.

As a proper noun, Antarctica has a long pedigree but a short history. It was coined and popularised by the Edinburgh mapmaker J. G. Bartholomew in the 1890s as a label for the supposed south polar continent outlined by John Murray of the Challenger Commission. By 1902 it was ‘slowly coming into use’ and by 1928 had been ‘generally received’ by geographers.

Reading Captain Richard Woodman's lament on the lack of an appropriate campaign medal for those serving in British ships involved in the transport of supplies to north Russia from 1941 to 1945 (Woodman 2007), I was reminded of their predecessors in the Great War of 1914 to 1918, when the timber port of Archangel, towards the mouth of the Dvina, together with Vladivostok, were Imperial Russia's only outlets to the sea. Captain R.F. Scott's auxiliary barque Discovery was one of a number of ships chartered to the French Government by the Hudson's Bay Company to carry matériel from Brest to the White Sea, in peril not only of tempestuous seas, but of ice and the 285 mines laid in that sea by the German auxiliary cruiser Meteor, in June 1915.