Pushing equipment to limit in ice continent

By PETER GRIFFIN

Next time you gripe about the poor battery life of your notebook computer, spare a thought for scientists trying to power up their computers in the heart of icy Antarctica.

New Zealand scientists are increasingly travelling to the great southern continent to take part in world-class research projects but are finding the common computer "freeze-up" takes on a whole new meaning.

Computers and temperature have always had a volatile relationship and, while the fans that hum away in the back of most PCs are aimed at cooling the Machine, the ice-bound scientists have the opposite task - keeping their vital computer equipment warm.

Matt Watson, a geophysicist with Groundsearch EES and part-time PhD student at the University of Auckland, is involved in a three-year project to map the glacial history of the South Victoria Land coast in Antarctica.

Atmospheric gas and dust trapped within the glaciers are analysed to reveal glimpses of information about the climate that existed thousands of years ago.

Working on the ice can be a trying experience, says Mr Watson. Computer cables freeze solid, connectors cannot be undone, LCD panels crystalise and break, and batteries last just a fraction of their normal life.

Last October, he travelled to Antarctica to collect data on ice thickness, layering and internal glacial structures using a Tecra notebook computer borrowed from Toshiba.

Each day, Mr Watson and PhD student Nancy Bertler from Victoria University covered about 20km to 30km of glacier collecting hundreds of megabytes of data on their ground penetrating radar.

"Most days, the temperature hovered at around minus 20 degrees. I had to strap a pencil to my mitt and punch the control keys on the radar. Exposing any flesh in those temperatures can be very painful."

One of the biggest challenges the ice-bound scientific teams face is generating power to run their computer equipment. Diesel generators were used to refresh the notebook battery pack but the generators had to be preheated, a slow and time-consuming process.

"We used solar panels and a generator to charge the batteries. However, the weather was often too windy for the solar panels and the generator needed pre-heating before it would start.

"Feeding "power-hungry" equipment was a constant challenge."

The notebook was used mainly in the relative warmth of a tent, where the temperature hovered around a "tropical" minus five degrees. In the space of two weeks the team collected more than 4Gb of data.

Although rugged PCs for engineers are widely available, few manufacturers have designed computers with severe temperatures in mind and what equipment is available is prohibitively expensive.

Despite the limitations of the equipment, Mr Watson is keen to return to the ice this year to do further research with technology earlier scientists could only have dreamed of.

"Scientists these days have high-tech clothing, helicopter transport and global communications when they are working on the ice which enables them to concentrate on their research.

"At the beginning of last century it would have been a full-time job just surviving."