vii
Introduction
Climate change is forcing visible impacts onto the sensitive polar regions which are
seen in the form of depleting sea ice in the Arctic and consequently the opening up
of new maritime routes, melting and breaking of ice shelves in Antarctica, deteriorating health of Himalayan glaciers, etc. The need to assess the changing face of the
cryosphere in the polar regions including the Himalaya; discuss the extreme events,
climate modelling and teleconnections of climate between polar region and Indian
summer monsoon; and develop adaptation strategies led to the 4th Conference on
Science and Geopolitics of Himalaya, Arctic and Antarctica (SaGHAA IV) near the
end of the year 2017. The conference was in continuation of the SaGHAA biannual
series held in 2011, 2013 and 2015. The present volume, therefore, can be seen as a
publication in line and in continuation to an earlier volume Science and Geopolitics
of the White World: Arctic-Antarctic-Himalaya published in 2017 by Springer.
Some of the key papers presented in the SaGHAA-IV were invited for publication titled Climate Change and the White World. Fourteen papers were selected and
divided in three parts/sections, viz. Arctic and Antarctic, climate change and adaptation and Himalayan cryosphere and climate change, encompassing nearly all the
themes that were discussed in the technical sessions of SaGHAA IV. The papers
selected cover a wide range of subjects varying from current topics of interest in
Arctic and Antarctic and geopolitical advances in the Arctic Region to adaptation
strategies in the Himalayan Region in response to climate change and glaciological
research in the Himalaya in the light of global warming.
The first part dealing with Arctic and Antarctic has four papers, namely, Emerging
Traits of Sea Ice in the Atlantic Sector of the Arctic by Nalan Koç and her coworkers; Indian Arctic Multisensory Moored Underwater Observatory by Atmanand
and his research group; The Arctic Ocean: Advances in Geopolitics and Geoscience
by Walter Roest and Richard Haworth; and Glacial Sediments of Schirmacher
Oasis, Central Dronning Maud Land, East Antarctica and their characteristics by
Rasik Ravindra.
Introduction
Climate change is forcing visible impacts onto the sensitive polar regions which are
seen in the form of depleting sea ice in the Arctic and consequently the opening up
of new maritime routes, melting and breaking of ice shelves in Antarctica, deteriorating health of Himalayan glaciers, etc. The need to assess the changing face of the
cryosphere in the polar regions including the Himalaya; discuss the extreme events,
climate modelling and teleconnections of climate between polar region and Indian
summer monsoon; and develop adaptation strategies led to the 4th Conference on
Science and Geopolitics of Himalaya, Arctic and Antarctica (SaGHAA IV) near the
end of the year 2017. The conference was in continuation of the SaGHAA biannual
series held in 2011, 2013 and 2015. The present volume, therefore, can be seen as a
publication in line and in continuation to an earlier volume Science and Geopolitics
of the White World: Arctic-Antarctic-Himalaya published in 2017 by Springer.
Some of the key papers presented in the SaGHAA-IV were invited for publication titled Climate Change and the White World. Fourteen papers were selected and
divided in three parts/sections, viz. Arctic and Antarctic, climate change and adaptation and Himalayan cryosphere and climate change, encompassing nearly all the
themes that were discussed in the technical sessions of SaGHAA IV. The papers
selected cover a wide range of subjects varying from current topics of interest in
Arctic and Antarctic and geopolitical advances in the Arctic Region to adaptation
strategies in the Himalayan Region in response to climate change and glaciological
research in the Himalaya in the light of global warming.
The first part dealing with Arctic and Antarctic has four papers, namely, Emerging
Traits of Sea Ice in the Atlantic Sector of the Arctic by Nalan Koç and her coworkers; Indian Arctic Multisensory Moored Underwater Observatory by Atmanand
and his research group; The Arctic Ocean: Advances in Geopolitics and Geoscience
by Walter Roest and Richard Haworth; and Glacial Sediments of Schirmacher
Oasis, Central Dronning Maud Land, East Antarctica and their characteristics by
Rasik Ravindra.