Forty Years of Northern Natural Science

Abstract

In a review of some of the research activities in the North over the past 40 years, with special reference to the arctic areas of Canada and Alaska, we find that most of the objectives outlined in the early 1950s have been achieved. We now know much more about the plants, terrestrial arthropods, freshwater ecology, marine ecology and terrestrial vertebrates. We have at least a conceptual view of how the different organisms fit together in the natural arctic ecosystem. The ecosystems appear to be rather simple and relatively stable, but do not have unlimited resilience.