Pioneering research in North Greenland funded by VR

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Jaroslaw Majka (PI) and Christian Schiffer have been granted the VR Project “Proterozoic-Paleozoic histories of North Greenland: pivotal windows for deciphering the High Arctic tectonic puzzle” to perform pioneering research at the northern tip of Greenland. The current knowledge about the geological history of the Arctic suffers from key data gaps. This project, conducted in collaboration with a large international network, will use an integrated geological-geophysical approach to tackle several outstanding issues of the Proterozoic-to-Palaeozoic tectonic development in one of the most undersurveyed areas in the World.

This research initiative will use the unique opportunity to reach North Greenland by the GEOEO expeditions of Swedish Icebreaker Oden in late summer 2024. During the expedition, geological sampling and mapping will be performed, and seismological stations will be installed. Additional terrestrial expeditions will be conducted in the following years to refine the geological sampling and to retrieve the seismological data, from which the first detailed lithosphere model of the region will be developed.

Based on the geological data and geophysical models, this project aims to resolve the geological history and structure of North Greenland, as well as its spatial and temporal relationships to other parts of the Arctic (Arctic Canada, Svalbard, Northern Scandinavia). The project will immensely advance our basic geological understanding of the entire Arctic, but also knowledge about resource potential in North Greenland and knowledge about phenomena such as post-glacial seismicity and deformation.