Biocomplexity of Patterned Ground: Mould Bay Expedition

A team of 24 people from the University of Alaska Fairbanks and other organizations worked at Inuvik, NorthWest Territories (NWT) and Mould Bay, Prince Patrick Island, NWT during the period 12-27 July 2004, as part of the "Biocomplexity associated with biogeochemical cycles in arctic frost-boil ecosystems" project. This year's work was the third in a 5-year project. The main objective of the research is to investigate the properties of small patterned-ground ecosystems along a climate gradient from the coldest parts of the Arctic to the northern boreal forest. The team is studying earth hummocks, non-sorted circles, small non-sorted polygons, and turf hummocks - how they form, how they vary with climate and substrate, and their role in total ecosystem functions.