Images of dinosaurs as cold-blooded creatures needing tropical temperatures could be a relic of the past. University of Alaska Fairbanks and Florida State University scientists have found that nearly all types of Arctic dinosaurs, from small bird-like animals to giant tyrannosaurs, reproduced in the region and likely remained there year-round.

U.S. Senators Dan Sullivan (R-Alaska) and Angus King (I-Maine), along with Representatives Mike Gallagher (R-Wisc.) and Elaine Luria (D-Va.) in the House of Representatives, today introduced the Arctic Security Initiative Act of 2021, legislation requiring the Department of Defense (DOD) to conduct a security assessment of the Arctic region and establish an Arctic Security Initiative (ASI) with a five-year plan to fully resource the DOD and individual service-specific strategies for the Arctic that have been released over the past several years. U.S. Northern Command (USNORTHCOM) would lead the independent assessment in coordination with U.S. Indo-Pacific Command (USINDOPACOM) and U.S. European Command (USEUCOM). 

On the summer solstice (June 20 — the longest day of the year) two European Union satellites recorded a scorching temperature of 118 degrees Fahrenheit (48 degrees Celsius ) on the ground in Arctic Siberia. This isn't quite a new heat record; as a post on the EU’s Copernicus satellite website noted, this egg-boiling temperature was detected only on the ground in Siberia's Sakha Republic, while the region's air temperature (the temperature people would actually feel while walking around) was a toasty 86 F (30 C).

For the first time, a Regional Conference on Permafrost will be combined with the bi-annual 19th International Conference on Cold Regions Engineering. This conference is hosted by the US Permafrost Association, the American Society of Civil Engineers, the International Permafrost Association, the Permafrost Young Researchers Network, and the University of Colorado Boulder. A complete list of planned sessions is available here.

Organizers announce, that due to the coronavirus outbreak, the 2nd Symposium on Polar Microbes and Viruses has been postponed to 2022. This symposium will bring together molecular microbial ecologists specializing in different organism groups to share our latest results and discuss methodological problems, as well as future prospects in the field, including practical international collaborations. The environmental focus will be on cryospheric environments including sea ice, glaciers, ice sheets, and permafrost, but excellent research in other polar environments is also invited. The methods to be discussed will focus on 'omics' techniques, ranging from single cells to metagenomes, but research using additional methods is encouraged as well.