Bangladeshi scientist Fairuz selected for US Antarctic Program

Fairuz Ishraque, a Bangladeshi scientist, has been selected for the US Antarctic Program, a US government initiative focused on research in Antarctica. As part of the program, he recently travelled to the icy continent to conduct research in the Allan Hills, a notable group of hills in the region.

In a Facebook post on November 19, Fairuz said, "I have safely reached the McMurdo Station in Antarctica. Honoured and privileged to be the first Bangladeshi scientist to be deployed by the US Antarctic Program."

According to his post, he will spend the next few days training. Afterwards, he will be deployed to the Allan Hills to drill into the ice cores there.

Fairuz is a graduate student at Princeton University, where he is conducting his PhD research under the supervision of Professor John Higgins as part of The Higgins Research Group. His work focuses on the Allan Hills ice cores, with research areas including Geophysics, Geology, and Climate Science.

In 2024, Fairuz was named a 'UCAR Next Generation Science Fellow', a fellowship that supports emerging researchers in Earth system science. As part of this fellowship, he will collaborate with scientists at the NCAR Climate and Global Dynamics Lab, working to reconstruct the ice flow and climate history of the Allan Hills region, as per the Geosciences Princeton University official website.

According to the polar affairs information platform PolarJournal, earlier this year, 4.6 million-year-old ice was discovered in Allan Hills, predating ice from the ice age. Further exploration into this icy wonderland has the potential to reveal fascinating discoveries and unearth mysteries regarding earth's history.