Research Objectives:
During the first two decades of the 20th century, Europeans mounted a handful of expeditions in hopes of reaching (and claiming) the geographic South Pole. Base camps established in the McMurdo Sound region by Scott at Hut Point and Cape Evans and by Shackleton at Cape Royds were abandoned once the expeditions were over, leaving behind thousands of artifacts, as well as the huts the explorers built for shelter and storage. Over the intervening 90 years, the extremes of the polar environment have actually protected some of the artifacts from rapid decay, but conservators have recently become concerned about the serious degradation of what is an important historical, archaeological site.
Some of the gravest threats are as follows:
+ Wood in contact with the ground is being destroyed by a specific wood-destroying fungus. Various molds and cellulose-degrading fungi are attacking artifacts made of leather, textiles, and other organic materials.
+ Exterior wood is being degraded by nonbiological processes as well, including salt, ultraviolet radiation, and wind erosion.
+ Chemical damage within the huts is apparent, and the soils on the site are contaminated with aromatic hydrocarbons from petroleum products.
We plan to identify the biological and nonbiological agents responsible for the deterioration, study the mechanisms and progressive sequence of the events taking place, test methods to be used to control future deterioration, determine the extent of environmental pollutants in soils at the historic sites, and evaluate chemical spills within the huts. The goal is to provide the scientific data conservators need to help protect these important sites for future generations. But the project should also shed light on these unique deterioration processes, as well as augment scientific understanding of the biology of antarctic microorganisms and the biodiversity of microbes present in this unusual environment.
