Below the Convergence

Nearly two years ago, a colleague of mine made me a once in a lifetime offer: to join a team that would spend seven weeks working at a research station in Antarctica, the kind of offer that one cannot refuse. And refuse I did not, but it was not an easy decision. To begin with, such a trip would make me unreachable to people chasing me for faculty meetings, grant reports, referee reports, annual reports... The thought was almost unbearable, but I felt that I could handle such isolation. Other potential sources of distress were the harsh Antarctic weather and the very short daylight that we would encounter – our trip would take place at the end of the Antarctic fall – but, again, having lived in Dundee (Scotland) for four years, these I also felt I could handle. However, there was something else. As anyone knows, Spain is a peninsula with a long and intense maritime tradition. Yet, I am from Madrid, a city located right in the middle of the central arid plateau, 400 km away from the nearest sea and 600 meters above sea level; as far away from the sea as you can be when you are in Spain. Not surprisingly, seafaring is not in my genes. And it just so happened that our destination could only be reached by sailing across the Drake Passage, renowned as one of the world’s roughest stretches of ocean, and definitely not the best choice for a gentle initiation into sailing. Eventually, however, I did not allow this minor consideration to become an impediment, and on Sunday April 27th 2008 I went onboard R/V Laurence M. Gould, a 76 meter long, ice-strengthened research vessel (http://www.nsf.gov/od/opp/support/ gould.jsp), for the four-day crossing of the Drake, from Punta Arenas to My Word Antarctica. Interestingly, the mooring point of the Gould was not far from what remains of the old pier once used by Ernest Shackleton. I will only add to this point that the infamous waters lived up to my expectations; the trip South was shaky, and the trip back North was atrocious (http://www. youtube.com/watch?v=4sp72e_kejM). Our destination was Palmer Station (http://pal.lternet.edu/). Run by the US Antarctic Program, Palmer is located in Anvers Island, off the West coast of the Antarctic Peninsula (64.7 S, 64.0 W), and provides facilities for a range of research projects. Originally built by the US Navy, the station comprises two main buildings known as Bio Lab and GWR, and a number of smaller ones. Bio Lab houses the biological laboratories, together with services like the kitchen, dining room, communications centre, and weather room, as well as the bedrooms, still referred to as ‘berthing’ areas — a remnant of Palmer origins, like the concise and self-explanatory name of GWR, short for Garage, Warehouse, and Recreation areas. Nowadays, GWR also has its own berthing area. The smaller buildings include the aquarium, boathouse, dive locker building and others used for a number of geophysical science projects. Palmer is run on a communal basis and, besides everyone’s specific duties as support personnel, scientists, surgeon, etc., all house chores like dishwashing, carpet cleaning, waste removal, window cleaning and the rest are shared without exception by everyone in the station, regardless of rank or experience. Our expedition was part of an NSFfunded project led by Professor Bill Detrich of Northeastern University, a marine biologist with ample experience on Antarctica (to whom I am indebted for this unique opportunity). Our goal was to collect material to study molecular determinants of cold adaptation of microtubule assembly and chaperonin-mediated protein folding in Antarctic fishes. The study would concentrate on two species of rockcod, Gobionotothen gibberifrons and Notothenia coriiceps, which amazingly develop, have mitosis, eat, mate and thrive in waters with the unappealing annual mean bottom temperature of −1.0°C. And getting those fishes was part of the fun. We collected them by benthic Otter trawl from the L.M. Gould in a number of expeditions that took us away from Palmer, sailing and trawling for a few days. Actually, the staff from the Gould did the trawling and we merely lent them a hand. These trips were really exciting. In one of them we crossed the Antarctic Circle — and got the corresponding certificate for it! In another of these trips we sailed, escorted by whales and penguins, along the Lemaire Channel and took