Today is the final day of IceCube’s spring 2021 collaboration meeting. For the third time, the semi-annual meeting was held virtually due to the pandemic. With 338 registered participants, it is likely the most attended IceCube collaboration meeting ever. Every weekday for the last two weeks, IceCube collaborators from around the world tuned into Zoom […]
Last week was relatively quiet at the Pole. IceCube’s winterovers performed a few detector maintenance tasks and gave a tour of the ICL to South Pole logistics personnel. Although winter is fast approaching and the sun is quite low, there is still plenty of daylight for taking outdoor photos. Above we see the tour group […]
The sun is getting noticeably lower in the sky at the South Pole. IceCube’s winterovers also note that it’s starting to get cold. Apparently, there’s “cold” and then there’s “South Pole cold.” Last week, the winterovers were busy outdoors, taking advantage of the lingering light to complete a round of IceTop snow measurements. They also […]
On December 8, 2016,* a high-energy particle called an electron antineutrino hurtled to Earth from outer space at close to the speed of light carrying 6.3 petaelectronvolts (PeV) of energy. Deep inside the ice sheet at the South Pole, it smashed into an electron and produced a particle that quickly decayed into a shower of […]
Last week was relatively quiet at the Pole, offering a good opportunity to get out and reflag the flag line between the IceCube Lab (ICL) and the station. They drill new holes and replace flags as needed to keep the line well maintained. The flags are easy to see now while the sun is still […]
Well, now it’s official—the South Pole station has closed for the winter. Above is a great shot that IceCube winterover Martin captured of the last passenger-carrying plane to depart. Below, the plane is shown being refueled, followed by a view of its take-off as it heads for McMurdo captured from the station’s observation deck. The […]
It’s still light outside, but winter at the South Pole is fast approaching. There were both arrivals and departures last week, and we can see that the departures (above) well outnumbered the arrivals (below). At this point, all the winterovers who will remain on station for this winter have arrived, and team building activities are […]
IceCube collaborator Frank G. Schroeder, assistant professor at the Department of Physics and Astronomy of the University of Delaware and the Bartol Research Institute, has been selected as a 2021 Sloan Research Fellow in Physics as announced today. According to the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, the Sloan Research Fellowship is one of the most prestigious […]
IceCube collaborator and Harvard physics professor Carlos A. Argüelles Delgado has been selected as a 2021 Sloan Research Fellow in Physics. The Alfred P. Sloan Foundation publicly announced this year’s fellows today. The Sloan Research Fellowships seek to stimulate fundamental research by early-career scientists and scholars of outstanding promise. The two-year fellowships are awarded every […]
![Large fuel bladders parked on the ice at the South Pole.]](https://res.cloudinary.com/icecube/images/w_150,h_113,c_scale/q_auto/v1613409623/2021week05_spot_fuel_jveitchmichaelis/2021week05_spot_fuel_jveitchmichaelis.jpg?_i=AA)
Last week at the Pole, the fuel arrived. A lot of it! It takes a lot of fuel to keep things operating all year long in this extreme environment, and like any other cargo, all that fuel must be transported in some way to this remote locale. That’s where SPOT—the South Pole Overland Traverse—comes in. […]