The article analyses the experience of international scientific cooperation in the Arctic in organising and conducting an academic Swedish–Russian Arc-of-Meridian expedition to the Spitsbergen archipelago in 1898–1901. This was one of the largest projects of its kind in history. The military and naval government agencies of the two countries were extremely interested in measuring the meridian arc near the Geographic North Pole. The fulfilment of this task made it possible to more accurately determine the shape of the Earth as a geoid. This was the significant and fundamental result of testing the hypothesis of the Newton–Huygens spheroid and was of applied importance. Funding for the expeditionary activities was carried out on a parity basis from the budgets of the two nations. The study of archival documents from the collections of the Russian Academy of Sciences Archives enabled an understanding of the unprecedented financial and physical costs of preparing and carrying out expeditionary work. Analysing inter-academic research of the late nineteenth – early twentieth centuries is valuable for understanding the potential interactions between the government and academic structures of international scientific cooperation in the Arctic during the modern era.

The effect of freshwater sources on wintertime sea-ice CO2 processes was studied from the glacier front to the outer Tempelfjorden, Svalbard, in sea ice, glacier ice, brine and snow. March–April 2012 was mild, and the fjord was mainly covered with drift ice, in contrast to the observed thicker fast ice in the colder April 2013. This resulted in different physical and chemical properties of the sea ice and under-ice water. Data from stable oxygen isotopic ratios and salinity showed that the sea ice at the glacier front in April 2012 contained on average 54% of frozen-in glacial meltwater. This was five times higher than in April 2013, where the ice was frozen seawater. In April 2012, the largest excess of sea-ice total alkalinity (AT), carbonate ion ([CO32−]) and bicarbonate ion concentrations ([HCO3−]) relative to salinity was mainly related to dissolved dolomite and calcite incorporated during freezing of mineral-enriched glacial water. In April 2013, the excess of these variables was mainly due to ikaite dissolution as a result of sea-ice processes. Dolomite dissolution increased sea-ice AT twice as much as ikaite and calcite dissolution, implying different buffering capacity and potential for ocean CO2 uptake in a changing climate.

In order to improve the understanding of how the high northern latitudes responded to the escalating warming which led to the middle Cretaceous super greenhouse climate, more temperature proxy records from the High Arctic are needed. One of the current obstacles in obtaining such records is poor age control on the Lower Cretaceous strata in the Boreal region. Here, we provide a biostratigraphic framework for the Rurikfjellet and Helvetiafjellet formations representing the lower part of the Lower Cretaceous succession on Spitsbergen. We also attempt to date the boundary between the Agardhfjellet and the Rurikfjellet formations. This study is based on dinoflagellate cysts (dinocysts) from three onshore cores (DH1, DH2 and DH5R) and three outcrop sections (Bohemanflya, Myklegardfjellet and Ullaberget). Relatively abundant and well-preserved dinocyst assemblages from the Rurikfjellet Formation date this unit as early Valanginian – early Barremian. The dinocyst assemblages from the Helvetiafjellet Formation are significantly impoverished and are characterized by reworking, but collectively indicate a Barremian–Aptian age for this formation.

In this study, seasonality and interannual variability of snow depth at two stations (Hornsund and Barentsburg) located in western Spitsbergen are investigated. For this purpose, the novel Moving Average over Shifting Horizon method combined with trend estimation was used. The Hornsund and Barentsburg stations exhibit similar snow depth trends during early autumn and late spring when statistically significant decreases were estimated at both stations (for August 1984–July 2016). In the remaining period, there are differences in outcomes between stations. The results for Barentsburg from October till the end of May are characterised by the lack of a trend while at Hornsund decreases of snow depth were estimated. The largest changes occur in May when the snow depth was at its maximum. Differences in the estimated tendencies were explained with the help of a trend analysis for air temperature and precipitation. An analysis of maximum snow depth, snow onset date, snow disappearance date and snow-cover duration is included. The results of the assessment depend on the location, with a lack of statistically significant changes in Barentsburg, and later snow onset date, shorter duration and decrease of maximum depth in Hornsund.

Based on seven measured sections from Svalbard, the marine strata of the Permian Kapp Starostin Formation are arranged into seven transgressive–regressive sequences (TR1–TR7) of c. 4–5 Ma average duration, each bound by a maximum regressive surface. Facies, including heterozoan-dominated limestones, spiculitic cherts, sandstones, siltstones and shales, record deposition within inner, middle and outer shelf areas. The lowermost sequence, TR1, comprises most of the basal Vøringen Member, which records a transgression across the Gipshuken Formation following a hiatus of unknown duration. Temperate to cold, storm-dominated facies established in inner to middle shelf areas between the latest Artinskian and Kungurian. Prolonged deepening during sequences TR2 and TR3 was succeeded by a long-term shallowing-upward trend that lasted until the latest Permian (TR4–TR7). A major depocentre existed in central and western Spitsbergen while to the north, Dickson Land remained a shallow platform, leading to a shallow homoclinal ramp in NE Spitsbergen and Nordaustlandet. The Middle Permian extinction (late Capitanian) is recorded near the base of TR6 in deeper parts of the basin only; elsewhere this sequence is not recorded. Likewise the youngest sequence, TR7, extending to the upper formational contact of latest Permian age, is found only in the basin depocentre. Comparison with age-equivalent strata in the Sverdrup Basin of Canada reveals a remarkably similar depositional history, with, for example, two (third-order) sea-level cycles recorded in the Late Permian of both regions, in keeping with the global record. Sequence stratigraphy may therefore be a powerful correlative tool for onshore and offshore Permian deposits across NW Pangaea.

Excavations conducted in 1982–1987 by the Polish archaeological expedition of Jagiellonian University in the Sørkappland and Hornsund fjord regions of Spitsbergen encompassed the three Pomor hunting stations of Bjørnbeinflyene, Palffyodden, and Schönningholmane, and included relics from the landing site on the Tørrflya coast used by the Pomors. The wood recovered during the excavations, originating from wooden dwellings, monumental crosses, and a shipwreck, was subjected to dendrochronological analysis. In total, 26 samples were examined, which allowed for the following chronologies to be developed: SPITS_A3 (larch, 9 samples, 208 yr); SPITS_B1 (pine, 5 samples, 222 yr); and SPITS_C1 (spruce, 2 samples, 142 yr). The dendrochronological dating obtained for the spruce sequence was established as AD 1769–1910. The chronological position of the remaining sequences was established by means of wiggle-matching. The results suggest that the youngest rings of the larch sequence cannot be older than AD 1745, and the youngest rings of the pine sequence date within the period of AD 1697–1805 or 1837–1869. Absolute dates obtained for the wood from the huts from the northern part of Sørkappland are consistent with the chronological framework established based on historical data. Thus, the hypothesis positing pre-Barents chronology of the Russian promysl in the investigated area could not be confirmed.

Lower Triassic marine strata in Spitsbergen accumulated on a mid-to-high latitude ramp in which high-energy foreshore and shoreface facies passed offshore into sheet sandstones of probable hyperpycnite origin. More distal facies include siltstones, shales and dolomitic limestones. Carbon isotope chemostratigraphy comparison allows improved age dating of the Boreal sections and shows a significant hiatus in the upper Spathian. Two major deepening events, in earliest Griesbachian and late Smithian time, are separated by shallowing-upwards trends that culminated in the Dienerian and Spathian substages. The redox record, revealed by changes in bioturbation, palaeoecology, pyrite framboid content and trace metal concentrations, shows anoxic phases alternating with intervals of better ventilation. Only Dienerian–early Smithian time witnessed persistent oxygenation that was sufficient to support a diverse benthic community. The most intensely anoxic, usually euxinic, conditions are best developed in offshore settings, but at times euxinia also developed in upper offshore settings where it is even recorded in hyperpycnite and storm-origin sandstone beds: an extraordinary facet of Spitsbergen's record. The euxinic phases do not track relative water depth changes. For example, the continuous shallowing upwards from the Griesbachian to lower Dienerian was witness to several euxinic phases separated by intervals of more oxic, bioturbated sediments. It is likely that the euxinia was controlled by climatic oscillations rather than intra-basinal factors. It remains to be seen if all the anoxic phases found in Spitsbergen are seen elsewhere, although the wide spread of anoxic facies in the Smithian/Spathian boundary interval is clearly a global event.

Three species of dexaminid amphipods are currently known from the Arctic, but none of them have been hitherto recorded in the west Spitsbergen fjords (Svalbard). In 2010, four individuals of dexaminid Guernea (Prinassus) nordenskioldi were sampled for the first time in the mouth of Isfjorden, a large fjord system located at 78°N. The species was originally described by Hansen (1888) from West Greenland and since then it has been collected in a number of locations showing almost circumarctic distribution. This study represents the first record of the family Dexaminidae and the species G. (P.) nordenskioldi from west Spitsbergen (Greenland Sea).

Ion microprobe dating in Wedel Jarlsberg Land, southwestern Spitsbergen, provides new evidence of early Neoproterozoic (c. 950 Ma) meta-igneous rocks, the Berzeliuseggene Igneous Suite, and late Neoproterozoic (c. 640 Ma) amphibolite-facies metamorphism. The older ages are similar to those obtained previously in northwestern Spitsbergen and Nordaustlandet where they are related to the Tonian age Nordaustlandet Orogeny. The younger ages complement those obtained recently from elsewhere in Wedel Jarlsberg Land of Torellian deformation and metamorphism at 640 Ma. The Berzeliuseggene Igneous Suite occurs in gently N-dipping, top-to-the-S-directed thrust sheets on the eastern and western sides of Antoniabreen where it is tectonically intercalated with younger Neoproterozoic sedimentary formations, suggesting that it provided a lower Tonian basement on which upper Tonian to Cryogenian sediments (Deilegga Group) were deposited. They were deformed together during the Torellian Orogeny, prior to deposition of Ediacaran successions (Sofiebogen Group) and overlying Cambro-Ordovician shelf carbonates, and subsequent Caledonian and Cenozoic deformation. The regional importance of the late Neoproterozoic Torellian Orogeny in Svalbard's Southwestern Province and its correlation in time with the Timanian Orogeny in the northern Urals as well as tectonostratigraphic similarities between the Timanides and Pearya (northwestern Ellesmere Island) favour connection of these terranes prior to the opening of the Iapetus Ocean and Caledonian Orogeny.

The radiolarian Beothuka terranova occurs in the Arenigian Didymograptellus bifidus Biozone (uppermost Lower Ordovician) of Spitsbergen (Svalbard), associated with a diverse and well-preserved radiolarian fauna. The presence of typical Cambrian spicular radiolarians associated with derived spherical forms shows a gradational faunal change from the Cambrian to the Ordovician. The genus and species Antygopora ordovicica n. gen. et n. sp. is described.