During the warm Antarctic season, the refined Norwegian passenger ship known as Ms. Fritzjoff Nansen departs from Argentina on a turbulent Drake passageway south and on a regular basis for a journey to the Antarctic Peninsula. The cruise is home to more and more wealthy adventurers, bucket listers, and increasingly polar scientists seeking to collect data as public funds for research in Antarctica under the Trump administration.
The National Science Foundation is one of the world’s largest funders of scientific research and has an annual budget of around $9 billion to support most of US Antarctic research. Over the past few months, the Trump administration has ordered agencies to cut deeper, making scientists wonder how they will study everything, from melting glaciers and ice sheets to the effects of pollution from power plants and wildfires.
According to an exclusive report from Science, National Science Foundation director Seturaman Panchanashan resigned on Thursday after the White House directed the agency to cut more than half the budget and staff.
Panchanathan’s resignation follows Elon Musk’s previous order of government efficiency to freeze funds for all new research grants from the National Science Foundation, followed by the announcement last week that Doge will close over $200 million in “wasteful” research grants awarded by the agency.
Some experts are concerned that the Trump administration’s ongoing cuts to the National Science Foundation could mark the end of American research in Antarctica.
James Burns, co-founder of the Antarctic and Southern Ocean Coalition, is an international alliance of environmental and non-governmental organizations focusing on Antarctic conservation and research, and says the National Science Foundation has become “wicked language” within much of the Trump administration.
“It’s tragic to me to cut budgets from the National Science Foundation,” he told NBC News in an interview. “For whatever reason, there’s so much to learn in Antarctica, that’s not good on many levels for us.”
President Donald Trump’s orders, which specifically targeted Antarctic research, include the famous layoffs of staff from several National Science Foundations working on Antarctic projects and cuts in the essential construction funds for McMuldo Station, the continent’s largest U.S. research hub.
The Antarctic-based research project has already declined for several years. Decades of robust fieldwork has been disrupted and never recovered from Covid-19 restrictions. Currently, research on the world’s southernmost continent has been facing several years under Trump’s slash and burning policies.
However, on board Ms Nansen and her sister ship, Ms Roald Amundsen, Polar scientists have reliable funds for their research. HX Expeditions, which operates two Antarctic ships, hosts researchers from institutions such as West Washington University. University of California, Santa Cruz. National Snow and Ice Data Center. Their rooms and boards are covered by the purchase of tickets from tourists sailing to Antarctica for a once-in-a-lifetime trip.
“If we can’t pay customers to allow our ship to go south, we can’t support the research we are helping out,” said Verena Meraldi, chief scientist on the HX Expedition. “It’s not easy [to get there]. There are not many flights coming down here, and fewer research vessels. ”
Tourists traveling on the HX expedition are part of the explosive ecotourism industry, focusing on experiencing nature while helping to preserve the local area. According to the latest data from the International Association of Antarctic Tour Operators, the number of visitors to Antarctic has increased from about 8,000 per year to over 120,000 per year. By 2035, the ecotourism market is projected to grow to more than $550 billion.
On the expedition to the Antarctic Peninsula in late March, Ms Frittijoff Nansen would not have been able to reach Antaltica without the cruise, with over 400 ecotourists.
Alldred moved along with sterilized bags to collect samples of seaweed grown in Antarctica waters and snow algae. She is studying how climate change affects the carbon content of these Antarctic species, and Cruises provided a unique opportunity to collect new samples.
“We’ve never been anywhere with a research foundation,” says Alldred. “Instead, if I went to a base in the Antarctic in England, I could only sample within my area. Here I have gone to five different sites throughout the peninsula that may not have been previously studied.”
The boat was housed nearby scientists and ecotourists, giving scientists the unusual opportunity to explain their work directly to non-scientists through interactive sessions in an onboard lab. For ten days, enthusiastic passengers attended lectures from resident researchers, ate with them at the ship’s restaurant, sharing their first steps in the vast polar deserts of Antarctica.
“It’s incredible to share these experiences with people, explain why we do research, what kind of questions we answer, and they see them firsthand,” said Chloe Lou, a researcher who works with the California Ocean Alliance to capture the impact of tourist boats on Antarctica whales. “It fires me for my passion for my work.”
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