Heat waves increasingly affect the northern Arctic.

Puddles of water at the base of the glacier, bare tundra or with the presence of some plant species in bloom. This is the scenario observed by a team of scientists, including Frederick's Donato Giovannelli , and described in a study published in thelatest issue of Nature Communications, during a February 2025 expedition to the Svalbard Islands, halfway between mainland Norway and the North Pole.

The heat waves we are experiencing are no longer a summer prerogative, but now regularly strike in winter as well, and in the Arctic they are having devastating effects with exceptionally high temperatures leading to the melting of the snowpack that has always characterized the winter landscape here, with major impacts on respiration and microbial activity.

The combination of warm temperatures and the resulting precipitation is radically transforming the archipelago's landscape.

What is evident is that the winter thaw phenomenon is not just an anomaly, but is indicative of an altered and rapidly evolving Arctic ecosystem influenced by human-induced climate change.

At this rate, snow, long the dominant feature of Svalbard landscapes, may soon disappear: projections suggest a scenario in which rain becomes the dominant form of precipitation in the Arctic by the end of the century.

"We have not photographed an episode but a precise trend," Professor Giovannelli stresses, "and if today we are increasingly reckoning with the climate crisis even in the Mediterranean, which is warming up to 6 degrees above the seasonal average, and in Italy in general, with the melting of the Alpine glaciers, it is also because of what is happening in the Arctic. Therefore," he adds, " scientific research needs to accelerate, but most importantly, environmental policy action is needed to mitigate these changes and their potential effects on both Arctic ecosystems and global climate patterns.