The North and South Pole regions are the best places for research on high-altitude atmospheric physics, according to a Chinese scientist leading a 17- member expedition to the Arctic region.
Gao Dengyi, a research fellow with the Atmospheric Physics of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS), and his team left Beijing Tuesday and arrived at Tromoso, a city in Northern Norway, Wednesday, and at the Svalbad Islands on Friday.
China will build its first scientific research base in Svalbad for carrying out a three-year research program on the climate, environment and resources of the Arctic.
"An intensified investigation into North and South Pole regions will be of great significance to China's causes such as aerospace and prospecting of planets," said Gao.
Gao, who has researched conditions in the North Pole, South Pole and Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau, explained that the sun has the greatest impact on the earth, and the polar regions are the only places where radiation streams of solar particles, also called solar wind, can enter the earth's atmosphere.
Solar wind will cause many important atmospheric phenomena on the earth, Gao said. The cycle of activity of sunspots is almost synchronous with that of the earth's El Nino phenomenon, he said.
"Research on these phenomena will be of value for measuring geomagnetic latitude, improving radio and long-distance telecommunications, and deciding satellite launch orbits," said Gao, who also emphasized that a research base in the Arctic region offers an excellent opportunity for scientists to observe these atmospheric phenomena.
During the Chinese expedition's stay in Tromoso, they visited the high-altitude atmospheric physics radar observatory, which was built by six European countries and Japan at a cost of 58.14 million U.S. dollars.
Professor Asgeir Brekke with the Department of Physics of the University of Tromoso, also head of the observatory, said they were willing to step up cooperation with Chinese scientists in high-altitude atmospheric physics.
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