I am happy to share the news that my proposal SNOWFAS has been funded by the Norwegian Research Council within the framework of the Arctic Field Grant call 2025!
About the project
Over 14.000 different per- and polyfluoroalkyl (PFAS) substances are currently manufactured and potentially released into the environment. However, current methodological approaches only target a limited number of them (20-40), therefore limiting our understanding on the true magnitude of PFAS pollution.
SNOWFAS will address this knowledge gap by applying a new hybrid targeted/non-targeted screening method to identify known and unknown PFAS in Svalbard snow.
The main objective is divided into two specific objectives:
1) To assess the presence of both known and previously unidentified PFAS, offering more comprehensive insights into PFAS pollution in the Arctic;
2) to study their post-depositional behaviour in the snow, providing valuable data for interpreting ice-core records, especially those influenced by melting. In this context, SNOWFAS will investigate PFAS phototransformation at the snow surface and their remobilization in the snowpack due to rain-on-snow (ROS) events.
The project is currently running with analysis of the samples ongoing at the University of Bern and at the University of Basel.
Contributions
- Planned, organized and coordinated Arctic fieldwork.
- Managed coordination with international partners (National Research Council of Italy, Norwegian Polar Institute) for fieldwork logistics and deliverable implementation.
- Dissemination of project outputs.
Partners
The project was funded by the Norwegian Research Council (NOK 120.000).
University of Basel: principal investigator (Francois Burgay), analyses
Norwegian Polar Institute: logistics in the field
Institute of Polar Sciences (National Research Council of Italy): logistics in the field, laboratory facilities at the Dirigibile Italia Arctic Station
University of Bern: analysis
Publications
Currently no publications available from this project
