This week had all the usual stuff—you know, calibrations, detector statistics, data handling, that kind of stuff. But it also had … Yuri’s Night. This is a global celebration held each April 12th to commemorate Yuri Gagarin, first man in space and an inspiration to many of the adventurous sort. The whole station observed the occasion with music and costumes. […]
In a paper submitted to Physical Review Letters, the IceCube Collaboration confirms highest energy neutrinos ever observed. […]
It’s cold and icy outside at the Pole, but not inside—although the blue tint of this image peeking in through an outside window of the ICL (IceCube Lab) might give the impression otherwise. The ICL is home to a serious cluster of computers, for the South Pole or anywhere. Below is a less formidable sort of computer also at the Pole, but just decorating someone’s desk. It’s a cardboard replica of the 1960s educational toy Digi-Comp I, a fully functional mechanical computer. Nice, just not up to snuff for IceCube’s needs. The kitchen seems to be a happening place lately. This week yielded authentic Chilean empanadas. […]
With the sun just below the horizon and a full moon in the sky, this landscape could be confused for a daytime shot. It was a quiet week for the detector but there was plenty going on to keep folks busy at the station:
— a night off for galley staff brought other “chefs” to the kitchen for pizza making,
— Easter egg decorating meant a hunt for “neutrinos,” and
— World Table Top Game Day spawned a round of Carcassonne, a medieval-themed board game. […]
You may know that the University of Wisconsin–Whitewater is home to an observatory, giving people a look at the visual Universe. Many people don’t know, though, that Wisconsin played a major role in the construction and management of one of the world’s largest and most interesting telescopes, the IceCube Neutrino Observatory, located at the South Pole in Antarctica. […]
You’d think it was science and adventure that lured these winterovers to the Pole, but it looks like it might be the food. Those are some nice looking plates. Each year the station holds a special celebratory dinner—the sunset dinner—the last one before the sun leaves them for a good long while. That’s something worth celebrating. […]
Someone is up high, quite high in fact. That’s the ARO (Atmospheric Research Observatory) tower, a good spot for surveying the landscape. ARO is a National Science Foundation facility used in support of scientific research related to atmospheric phenomena. Its long-term research program measures trends of important trace gases and aerosols and investigates the influence of these gases and aerosols on the Earth’s climate. They aren’t measuring gases inside the South Pole station’s greenhouse, but look what’s going on in there—lots of growth. What a difference two weeks make. […]
The lowering sun is providing for some great photos, like these long shadows in front of and behind the IceCube Lab (ICL). The winterovers spent some time doing various things out in the cold this week. They raised their country flags—Chile, the US, and the Philippines—on the roof of the ICL. They also helped out their neighbors in the SPUD experiment, moving a 300-lb mirror off the detector array. […]
What’s green and frilly and grows at the South Pole? Outside, nothing, but inside, we’re talking lettuce. Leafy greens, cucumbers, tomatoes…even cantaloupe—a variety of produce is grown in the South Pole greenhouse. These are the only fresh vegetables available from about mid-February to mid-October for the teams wintering over at the station. The sun has been getting lower, and they will soon be entrenched in their six months of darkness. Some fresh vegetables will at least brighten up their plates. […]
There’s work and then there’s play. And sometimes play can take a lot of work. Like building an igloo at the South Pole, for example—check it out. You can see it in progress during construction, above, and the view from inside, looking through the “sun roof,” after completion, below. The IceCube winterovers had cold temperatures and wind chills (below -60 °C) for their work, too, which was also outdoors this week. They performed a snow survey, in which they had to measure the height of all the posts located over the IceTop tanks (IceTop is the surface component of the IceCube detector). […]