Levente Iván

I joined PermaIntern in January 2024 through the PermaChile research programme. My thesis supervisor was Sebastian Ruiz Pereira. The team I joined was an international collaboration between Hungarian, Chilean and Italian researchers. I did my internship in Chile, doing field research in several locations.

For me, it was very motivating to work with and learn from older researchers with a great knowledge of the subject and to build international contacts. In my opinion, such courses are very constructive for young researchers and students, as it is a way to really transfer a lot of experience to younger generations. It gives them a real insight into aspects of research life and gives them the chance to encounter real-life situations and tasks that they will be able to do individually later on. For this reason, I consider the PermaIntern programme to be very useful in terms of educating young people.

During the fieldwork I was introduced to many research methods. I got to know the methods of research in extreme areas. Working in these places is much more difficult and limited than in normal conditions. The difficult access, the cold, the strong winds, the low oxygen levels, all present challenges that need to be addressed individually in order to be successful. Instruments and methods must be selected to work under extreme conditions.

The research was carried out in three different areas, the Atacama Desert on the Puna de Atacama plateau on the Ojos del Salado volcano and its surroundings, Patagonia in the Torres del Paine National Park and the Tierra del Fuego in the Darwin Cordillera mountains.

Ojos del Salado (22 January 2024 - 30 January 2024)

In this area, the PermaChile research programme has been conducting monitoring research on climate change and related permafrost properties for 12 years. This is complemented by a range of other research topics, including geomorphology, cartography, microbiology and soil zoology. Because of the extreme environment, this area is a very good indicator of climate change, because any small changes in the area can be quickly detected, allowing us to quickly detect changes on the Earth. In addition, the very high altitude and the very high UV radiation due to the rare and humid air make it a Mars analogue area.

During the work, we replaced the data logger instruments measuring the surface temperature and humidity at different altitudes (from the foot of the mountain to the summit) and downloaded the data recorded over several years.

Permafrost is already present as an island at 5200 m in the mountain range, and at 5800 m the frozen substrate is continuous. Samples of this frozen sediment, which contains water, were taken by drilling to determine the chemical analysis of the water and ice. In addition, water samples were collected from intermittent lakes and streams at different elevations in the mountains.

In addition, we measured, identified and collected sediment samples from moraines remaining after the last glacial period for age determination. Microbiological samples were taken from different depths during the thermometer replacement. Soil zoological samples were collected in the vicinity of the intermittent streams and ponds in the surrounding area.

Cordillera-Darwin - Tierra del Fuego, (23 Feb 2024 - 28 Feb 2024)

This is a new research area in the PermaChile research programme. In the field, first of all, we had to choose the good locations for the new ground temperature loggers. We also made geophysical measurements at different altitudes in the area to detect bedrock and ice content permafrost. Two different methods were used (ERT and seismic). In addition, we searched for and identified shapes and traces of periglacial processes in the active layer thawing in summer.

During the installation of the loggers, sediment samples were collected to determine the porosity of the substrate and microbiological samples were also collected.

Torres del Paine National Park (29 February 2024 - 04 March 2024)

In this area we replaced loggers installed 4 years ago and downloaded data. Geophysical measurements were also made here using both methods. We also did microbiological and zoological sampling.

The internship within the PermaIntern programme allowed me to experience how glacial and periglacial processes manifest themselves at different altitudes, from desert environments to cool oceanic climates. Observing this in the field has taught me a lot and I have learned many methods that will help me in my future studies and research. And I also collected data for my thesis.