UKPN Takeaways from the UK Arctic Science Conference (Sept 2025)
Written by Isabelle Sangha, Millie Harding and Leeza Pickering
In September, various UKPN committee members attended the UK Arctic Science Conference at Northumbria University, Newcastle Upon Tyne. It was a fantastic few days of science, networking and wider discussions about the future of UK Arctic Science.
Here are some highlights and reflections from Izzy, Millie, and Leeza about their experiences at the conference.
Polar Beers takeaways - Izzy
After the first day of the conference we met at the Hotspur pub for a Polar Beers event. In the packed and cozy pub, Dr. Amy Macfarlane gave a captivating talk about art as a way to communicate science with sounds of ice melting, clothing inspired by prints from ice, and moving poems about polar regions. Dr. Rachel Carr then brought everyone to the Dry Valleys of Antarctica to tell stories of what it’s like doing remote field work, and how to talk like a penguin.
We finished off the evening with a competitive polar themed pub quiz and the winning team left sporting the Polar Beers beanies. Overall it was a great success and fun way to kick off the UK Arctic Science Conference!
International Polar Year - Millie
On the first morning of the conference the UKPN held a session for Early Career Researchers (ECRs) which focused on the 5th International Polar Year 2032-2033 (IPY-5). It was great to share with ECRs the current status of the IPY-5 as well as sharing how this is likely to shape future research. We specifically focussed on IPY-5 as there was a general sentiment that information about IPY-5 was not reaching UK-based ECR’s. We felt it was important to make everyone aware of this so that ECR’s could take full advantage of the opportunities that may arise out of IPY-5. We also highlighted current projects that were already known to UKPN that are linked to IPY-5 more generally or were running separately but were likely to feed into IPY-5. After the initial presentation, we moved into a panel discussion which enabled ECR’s to ask questions about previous International Polar Years and understand more about the IPY-5 to Professor Kate Hendry, Henry Burgess (Head of the NERC Arctic Office), and Pilvi Saarikoski (Impact facilitator at the British Antarctic Survey).
Education and outreach takeaways - Leeza
Presenting alongside Millie in the ECR session was amazing! It gave me the chance to tell ECRs about all the things that the UKPN Education and Outreach team have been up to in the past year. Furthermore, it gave us a great platform to share our current project with ECRs - the UKPN Roadshow! This is a planned UK wide tour inspiring the next generation to consider careers in polar science. We had a lot of interested ECRs, who are eager to get involved. Thank you to all who have signed up already! If you are reading this and are interested in helping out, please sign up here (https://forms.gle/UDEn3gbmLQeQFe2w5)!
Moving away from the presentation, it was great to meet so many people interested in the Arctic. I had some amazing conversations with people interested in education and outreach and some very interesting discussions about Arctic research! It was a blast. Looking forward to seeing everyone at the next UK Arctic Science Conference!
UKPN at Arctic Circle Assembly 2025
As someone who’s conference experience has previously only been UK based science conferences, going to the Arctic Circle Assembly is a very different experience. The Arctic Circle Assembly is a yearly conference held in Reykjavik that brings together an international community of people interested in the Arctic – 70 countries were represented this year by the 2000 total attendees. The Arctic Circle Assembly is a unique experience, so the opportunity to attend is highly recommended (and the location isn’t too bad either!).
The thing that makes Arctic Circle a very different conference is the geopolitics of it. A large proportion of people attending the Arctic Circle Assembly are governmental officials, all there to represent their countries interests. Additionally, institutions such as the Arctic Council and NATO are represented. This year we even had Her Imperial Highness Princess Takamado of Japan giving a speech in the opening plenary! Working as a scientist in the Arctic geopolitics impacts your research even if you don’t feel like it does day to day. I think it’s important to have an awareness of how geopolitics is shaping the Arctic, attending Arctic Circle has really widened my understanding of the differing views and opinions of politics in the Arctic.
Being such a large conference, the conference has multiple sessions running at any one time, so planning was essential (made easy by the very handy app they created!). Sessions cover a broad range of topics, from the health impacts of wildfires on Arctic communities to talks with Neil Armstrongs family about a new film they’re a part of showcasing their fathers previously secret trip with Edmund Hillary to the Arctic in 1985! Alongside talks there are also invitation only roundtables to discuss business issues or topics like science diplomacy. Whilst there are no traditional ‘science’ talks or science poster sessions there is still a lot to get out of the conference as a scientist, especially as we’re coming up to International Polar Year 2032-2033 which had a lot of attention at the conference. Additionally, Indigenous communities had a large representation and presence in multiple talks. This representation is essential as none of these discussion can happen without Indigenous representation; to hear from members of Indigenous communities first hand experiences was incredibly beneficial to me as a researcher, but also to the wider Arctic community.
Additionally, the opportunity for networking is the best part of going. Talks are interesting but the connections you can build are what you really take away from a conference like this. Because everyone’s backgrounds are so varied, it really helps to promote cross disciplinary and international collaborations. It helps to connect with one or two people you know are going beforehand as it can be quite overwhelming walking into the massive Harpa Concert Hall, but even if you know no one there are plenty of opportunities to meet people at mixers.
I was lucky in securing funding from the NERC Arctic Office to support my attendance, as they were looking to send early and middle career researchers from the UK, so it is worth looking out for similar funding schemes to support your attendance in the future. Being supported by the NERC Arctic Office here in the UK to attend also meant I got to attend some special events. All British attendees to the conference were invited to a drinks reception the evening before it started at the British Ambassador to Iceland’s residence. Hosted by Dr Bryony Mathew, the current ambassador, it gave all British attendees an opportunity to mix and get to know one another. Later on in the conference schedule, attendees funded by the NERC Arctic Office were also invited to a dinner with Dame Angela McLean, the Chief Scientific Ad
visor to the UK government. This gave us a great networking opportunity and the chance to discuss our perspectives of UK Arctic science as well as hearing from Angela about gaining experience in the civil service as scientists (we also had a 7-course tasting menu that included raw scallops and beef tartare which is an experience I never thought I’d have!).
The conference closing night was also very different from anything I’ve experienced. The last plenary session included three musical performances from Nefur, a singer incorporating glacier sounds, Keli Armstrong & Friends singing about a flight Neil Armstrong took his son on and iDJA a Sámi DJ performing Sámi electronic music. After this, whilst at the closing drinks we also got treated to a spectacular northern lights show! Most of my time in Reykjavik the weather had been quite cloudy, but on the last night conditions turned out to be perfect. I’d never seen the northern lights before, so this was one of my highlights as well!
Overall attending the Arctic Circle Assembly was a great experience, if very tiring. I would recommend attending to any Early Career Researcher as it’s a completely unique experience, but particularly if you are interested in the political side of the Arctic or have career ambitions with government in mind. Use the time to build connections and soak up knowledge from everyone around you. You’ll be exhausted afterwards, but you’ll have a better, well-rounded perspective about the current issues facing the Arctic and its People’s.
Written by Lena Lencastle, PhD student Sheffield University, UKPN Education and Outreach Officer
CCfS Polar Symposium 2025
UKPN contributes to report published on the UK and the Antarctic environment
UKPN submitted written evidence to the House of Commons Environmental Audit Committee report on the UK and the Antarctic environment last year. The final report has now been published. We try to represent polar early career researchers wherever we can and this is the latest way that we did that!
Read our evidence and the report!
CINUK (Canada Inuit Nunangat United Kingdom Arctic Research Program) AGM and ArcticNet, Ottawa
I was very thankful to be awarded a travel grant under the "Next Generation UK-Canada Arctic Science Engagement Scheme" funded through the NERC Arctic Office. I attended with UKPN Committee members Louise, Jas and Dylan. For several years, CINUK has been devoted to advancing research in the Inuit Nunangat region with the National Inuit Strategy on Research (NISR) at its heart. It was fantastic to see the diversity in projects and their achievements of the past 3 years. Projects that stood out were Sikuttiaq (Changing ice conditions) , Nuna (Changing land conditions - which featured UKPN president Louise), NNSAR(Search and rescue) and BARIN (beavers and ecological research). These projects did a fantastic job implementing NISR collaborating with Inuit to reproduce cutting-edge research. Seeing collaboration with Inuit first hand really highlighted how research can have a positive impact on communities. It was great to get to know them further and discuss all things polar science and what this conference means for activities within UKPN. A highlight was having opportunities to network, experience Inuit culture and hear speeches from keynote speakers such as the Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami (ITK) President Natan Obed and Governor general of Canada, Mary Simon. Getting keynote speakers stood out as potential idea for UKPN in the future.
" Both conferences were a great way to start the winter season, providing plenty of food for thought as I begin my PhD."
Polar Week: Reflections on UKPN Festivals
Background to festivals
The last 2 years have been somewhat uncertain with the pandemic, but the UK Polar Network (UKPN) festivals team have been busy as ever organising online events, as well as gradually returning to in-person ones. There are multiple reasons for UKPN hosting festivals, including delivering scientific communication to the general public and providing a platform to early career researchers to develop their networks and experience.
UKPN at the National Maritime Museum
In October 2021, coordinators Chloe and Connor organised a festival facilitated by the National Maritime Museum (NMM) in Greenwich, London, with around 10 UKPN volunteers delivering science talks, hosting workshops and guessing where the Titanic sank over a 4-day period. The talks included the volunteers discussing their career as a researcher and polar impacts in a changing climate, with workshops incorporating polar adaptions, glacier flow (cornflour and water!) and dressing up as a polar scientist in field kit.
Each day started at around 9 am and ended at 4 pm with events running simultaneously. At any one time, the UKPNs 3D polar maps were being adored on the ‘Great Map’ section of the museum, while downstairs talks were taking place, glaciers constructed and animals were being forged by children with some rather interesting adaptions! Seeing the children engaged with the events left us with a ‘this is why we do this’ kind of moment and hopefully, some will remember their experience and be encouraged to continue the passion we saw over the 4 days.
This was our first in-person event since the pandemic struck and we received fantastic feedback from the museum saying visitors returned each day for our activities, bolstering their numbers as well as increasing our visibility to the general public. It would be remiss of us to highlight this event without a mention of our fantastic volunteers who developed materials and ideas prior to the event, as well as delivering the content. We had a range of people, including undergraduate and postgraduate students, PhD and postdoctoral researchers and teachers. For a lot of our volunteers, it was their first experience delivering outreach and they took to it like a duck to water! The reason we’re mentioning this is because we offer volunteering positions all year round to help with science festivals and if you’re interested, please do get in touch and/or keep an eye out on our mailing list for opportunities.
Upcoming festivals for UKPN
Just recently, we hosted 3 online events over 2 days at the Cardiff Science Festival in February 2022. In June of this year, we’re headed down to the Cheltenham Science Festival to deliver 5 polar workshops to both school and home-schooled children, including albedo experiments, Antarctic food webs and a changing Arctic.
Due to the success of the NMM event, we are currently working on making the event an annual one where UKPN can utilise the fantastic space of the museum and have a permeant base for delivering outreach, so stay tuned!
Some of the previous events we have hosted activities at:
- British Science Festivals (Birmingham, Aberdeen Newcastle)
- Regional Science Festivals (Dundee, Southampton, Cardiff, Edinburgh)
- Blue Dot Festival
- World of Music Arts and Dance
Get in touch
We strongly encourage organisations who are interested in UKPN delivering outreach to their audience to get in touch with us (festivals@polarnetwork.org). As said previously, our volunteers are often the highlight for both the festival and the general public delivering superb scientific communication, so if you are interested in any opportunities, once again get in touch with us, we would love to hear from you!
Abstract submission and registration open!