Rhodes scientists break new ground with all-women group
AN all-women team of scientists from Rhodes University is set to make South African polar research history when they sail off to Antarctica at the end of the month.
The three microbiologists, headed by Dr Gwynneth Matcher, will work around the South African National Antarctic Expedition IV (SANAE) base and Troll station at Jutulsessen.
According to Matcher, an all-female team is an anomaly on research expeditions to the Antarctica base which was opened in 1997.
“It’s not deliberate – it has just worked out that way.”
Nicknamed the “White Desert” by researchers, the flat landscape may have lots of snow and ice but it is still incredibly dry because it has no water.
It is also extremely windswept and can reach minus 89°C during the winter.
Although the team is going during the summer, it is still icy cold with temperatures well below freezing – despite the hole in the ozone layer being directly above Antarctica. During the summer months, there is 24 hours of sunlight, so allowing the researchers to work long hours.
But they have to regularly slap on large amounts of high-factor sunblock to prevent getting fried by the extreme solar radiation.
Matcher has teamed up with PhD students Karin Staebe and Sunet van Aswegen to research Antarctic microbial ecology.
Her team are the only microbiologists working in the area during the expedition, which will last for almost a month.
They will study the bacteria living in isolated meltwater ponds and in the soil on exposed mountain peaks that stick out the icy land mass.
“In the areas we are studying you won’t find any animals – none,” she said.
“You will occasionally find migratory birds that nest inland such as skuas and storm petrels, and that’s it.”
The team will use sequencing to look at the DNA of these microbes. A second team of four Rhodes researchers, headed by Professor Ian Meiklejohn, includes three women.
Despite several South African universities sending teams of scientists and students to conduct vital polar research again this Christmas, Rhodes University spokeswoman Catherine Deiner said the largest contingent would come from Grahamstown this year.
Meiklejohn’s team from the geography department will conduct research into what geomorphological (rock) features support the growth of lichen and whether or not they play a role in rock weathering.
Three MSc students – Jenna Knox, Tebogo Masebe and Nicola Wilmot – will work with Meiklejohn.
Although Masebe was introduced to the uniqueness of Antarctica and the research done there during her first-year studies, she admitted the thought of going there did not appeal to her at first, but she now welcomes the opportunity.