The European Polarstern Study 1988/89 2 3 Gotthilf Hempel\ Jarl-Ove Stromberg and Victor Smetacek 1 Zentrum fUr Marine Tropen6kologie, Centre for Tropical Marine Ecology, Universitatsallee GW lIA, D-2800 Bremen 33, FRG 2 Kristineberg Marine Biological Station, Kristineberg 2130, S-45034 Fiskebackskil, Sweden 3 Alfred-Wegener-Institut fUr Polar- und Meeresforschung, Am Handelshafen 12, D-2850 Bremerhaven, FRG This volume of"Polar Biology" is the product of a new ap- Antarctic; experimental and field; shallow water and ocea- proach to promote international cooperation in polar ma- nic; open water and pack-ice. All this was considered to sti- rine ecology - the European Polarstern Study (EPOS). This mulate and implant new ideas, approaches and methods venture brougth together 131 scientists from 14 countries in into marine Antarctic research, which had tended to be- Western and Central Europe and South America who parti- come somewhat dissociated from the main stream of inter- cipated in a series of three cruises on the ice-breaking rese- national marine ecology. To give some examples: Finnish arch vessel "Polarstern" to the Weddell Sea, Antarctica, from microbiologists normally studying bacteria in the freshwa- early austral spring to late autumn of19 88/89. The articles in ter ice of the Bothnian Bay, together with Dutch planktolo- this volume represent some of the contributions presented gists who had worked in Indonesian waters, coorporated at the EPOS Symposium held in Bremerhaven, Germany, in with German marine glaciologists. Ajoint Swedish-N orwe- May 1991.