The GEOCRYOLOGICAL CONFERENCE was held at the Melnikov Permafrost Institute during four days from August 2 to 5, 2010. Themes covered included regional and historical geocryology; periglacial processes and forms; hydrology and hydrogeology in cold regions; permafrost changes and landscape dynamics; and climate change and its effects on engineering structures.

Conference participants.

Dr. Tetsuya Hiyama, an invited speaker from the Research Institute for Humanity and Nature,  Kyoto,  Japan talked on global warming and human-nature dimension in  Siberia.

Lyudmila Lebedeva of the  Saint Petersburg  State  University  receives a best presentation award from Dr. Rudolf Zhang, MPI Director.

Antoine Sejourne of Universite Paris-Sud, France won the best presentation award for his talk, “Thermokarst Processes on Earth and Mars: Comparison Between Thermokarst Lakes and Thermokarst-Lake Depressions in Utopia Planitia, Mars”

Qian Jin from the Cold and Arid Regions Environmental and Engineering Research Institute, Lanzhou, China won the best presentation award for his progress report on Qinghai-Tibet Express Highway experimental research.

The FIELD WORKSHOP was held from August 6 to 16, 2010 and focused on ground ice, thermokarst and thaw depressions (alasses). Participants traveled in central Yakutia to examine permafrost conditions, hydrogeology, and frost-related processes and forms. Lectures and tutorials were given by the Permafrost Institute senior scientists.

Field trip route.

Buluus, a groundwater icing

Close-up view of the ice.

View on the Lena River valley. On the right is the serge, a totem pole of the Yakuts.

Qian Jin (CAREERI), Wang Jiliang, Li Huiyu (Heilongjiang Institute of Cold Region Engineering, Harbin) and Leonid Gagarin (MPI) taste hydrogen sulfide water from below the permafrost.

One person one tent.

Lin Zhanju, “a masterchef” from China is giving a cooking class (background) and Ilya Churkin of MPI is putting into practice what he has learned.

Alass is a typical landscape for Central Yakutia produced by thawing of a large area of thick and exceedingly ice-rich permafrost.

Alass formation is initiated by melting of thick ice wedges like these.

A bulgunnyakh, or a pingo, is the final stage of alass development.

Nikolai Bosikov (MPI), a distinguished expert on thermokarst, is giving a field lecture on alass stages.

Writing everything down, before forgetting.

Mamontova Gora (‘Mammoth Mount’) is an exposure of permafrost along the Aldan River, 300 km of the Aldan and Lena Rivers confluence. The permafrost is rich in ice and Pleistocene fauna remains.

Moving along the exposed ground ice.

Field camp on the Aldan River bank.

Digging into permafrost from top down…

or better from the side?