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U.S. defence researchers eye high Arctic

Radar tests on Ellesmere Island may be first of many projects

JANE GEORGE

Will the High Arctic become a test site for new U.S. defence technology?

High Arctic observers say Resolute Bay will be busy this summer as U.S. researchers test new radar technology on Ellesmere Island, although it's too early to know exactly which projects on new sensors and sensor networks will receive money from the U.S. National Science Foundation or purchase logistical assistance from Canada's Polar Continental Shelf Project.

But the NSF is now reviewing applications for projects from researchers who want to take advantage of a 10-year, $31-million U.S. pot of money for research into sensor and sensor networks.

Research projects could look at sensors that would be used in defence systems by detecting changes in the environment or air, or as the NSF Web site says, "detection of objects or events of interest."

Sensors can gauge minute changes by using sound, radar, or light waves, laser beams, and could be used, for example, in detecting or tracking missiles.

New sensor technology would make the huge radars of the DEW Line or at the Thule air base in northern Greenland modern-day dinosaurs, which would be replaced by new mini-sensors that could combine micro-processors, energy sources and communications.

"I wouldn't say the Arctic region is a useful region to be deploying sensors - it's the other way around. There are questions that we want and need to know about the Arctic region that may require sensor systems with much larger capabilities than the sensors we currently have, and those things may be in sight within the next five to 10 years if this research progresses," said Dr. Filbert Bartoli of the NSF's directorate for engineering.

A huge sensor network of small units would be much easier and less intrusive to install than say, the DEW line, and, when installed, it could send information more easily and efficiently to the outside.

"You don't want your sensor network putting out so much heat that it melts the ice," Bartoli said.

Sensor projects aren't the only ones that may send millions of dollars to the High Arctic. Since spring 2000, an international research team supported by the NSF has conducted annual expeditions each April to the North Pole to study the Arctic Ocean and learn how it helps regulate global climate, in a 10-year project worth $1 million to $2 million U.S. a year.

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