Czech scientists want to build 15 little green houses in the Antarctica to simulate the process of warming and the emergence of primitive plants in what were originally life-unfriendly conditions, Czech biologist Milos Bartak said on Wednesday.
The first results of the experiment are expected in five years, the Czech news agency CTK quoted Bartak, a biologist from Masaryk University in Brno as saying.
Four such green houses have yet been built on James Ross Island, Antarctica, for the time being.
The scientists will wait for the green houses to become green with algae, mosses and lichen, CTK said.
"Each little green house, spreading on about 1.5 square meter, contains a small recording device connected to 12 sensors monitoring changes in the green house," Bartak said.
Although the green houses lack roofs, the temperature inside is 2 degrees Centigrade higher than outside.
The enclosed space is protected from windstorm, but not from rain and snowfall. It thus simulates the conditions that can be expected on the earth in about 150 years in connection with the retreat of icebergs, according to CTK.
Experts from Brno, including biologists, climatologists and geologists, are leaving for the Czech polar base, situated at the James Ross Island and named after the 19th century "father of genetics" Georg Mendel, next week.
The station, which is to serve for 20 to 30 years, cost 60 million crowns (3.4 million U.S. dollars).
The scientists want to find out how life emerges in Antarctic oasis, or places "from where icebergs have retreated."
Source:Xinhua
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