Arctic PRIZE 3

Arctic PRIZE will focus on the shelf area of the Barents Sea and the region to the north
of Svalbard. It is an inflow shelf influenced by both Atlantic and Polar waters 23 where projections
suggest that sea ice declines will lead to the greatest increases in PP through increased upwelling of
nutrients at the adjacent shelf break 9. We will combine long endurance spatio-temporal sampling
provided by gliders, seals, moorings and remote sensing, with dedicated shipboard sampling (UK and
Norwegian ships) and autonomous underwater vehicles (AUV) for detailed process studies. We will
also use Rijpfjorden, a seasonally ice-covered fjord, for deployment of a seabed photolander to
observe temporal changes in benthic communities. These studies will give an unprecedented window
onto the interactions at play in the Barents Sea region during the massively under-sampled transition
from winter to summer to support modelling efforts.

Two gliders will be deployed and recovered from the Norwegian ship Helmer Hanssen on cruises in January, April and June to give overlapping deployments between January and June.