MINNEAPOLIS (AP) – A team of University of Minnesota researchers who are admired in academic circles for their work mapping Antarctica, are now expanding their work to include the Arctic.

The university says the work is part of a nearly $4 million, five-year cooperative agreement with the National Science Foundation.

Led by Paul Morin in the university’s College of Science and Engineering, the Polar Geospatial Center will now provide support and training for other researchers studying the Earth’s poles.

Morin says the work influences everything from the movement of glaciers to the study of penguin colonies to the landing of military aircraft in remote areas.

Using high-resolution satellite imagery, Morin and his staff have collaborated with other researchers to complete the first-ever census of emperor penguins and used the technology to count Weddell seals.

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