“Qeriuaannartoq malugineqarsinnaavaa?”: Permafrost interactions at Greenland Science Week in Sisimiut, Kangerlussuaq and Nuuk
What does permafrost feel like?
"Qeriuaannartoq malugineqarsinnaavaa?"
How does permafrost sound?
Is there something you would like to tell or share about permafrost?
The setting is Greenland Science Week, held from November 7 to 14, 2025, and the questions are hanging over an interactive permafrost stand in the lobby of Taseralik, the culture house in Sisimiut, Greenland’s second largest city. Two cores of permafrost, sampled from the area and until today stored in a freezer, are placed in bowls on a table of the stand, slowly thawing as the hours of the event and visitors pass by. Water seeps out of the cores, leaving silt and clay and sand to hold together by itself.
Engineer and permafrost researcher Thomas Ingeman-Nielsen from Arctic permafrost geotechnics. The course will be taught at Arctic DTU Sisimiut—a campus and INTERACT research station of the Technical University of Denmark in Sisimiut and anthropologist Astrid Oberborbeck Andersen from Aalborg University are populating the permafrost stand as researchers. They are both part of EduPermaGR, a UArctic-funded project with the purpose of developing an interdisciplinary permafrost higher education course, focusing on the latest scientific and technological knowledge. For over a year, a team of researchers from engineering, natural sciences and social sciences have been collaborating on the course design and content, consulting and engaging community and stakeholders in Sisimiut and Kangerlussuaq along the way. The participation in Greenland Science Week is a part of the course design and outreach.
Through interactions around the stand and talks in Sisimiut and Kangerlussuaq, and a presentation at the Greenland Science Conference in Nuuk, the researchers of EduPermaGR presented the research and work behind the course “Permafrost in Arctic Societies”. The course will be taught for the first time in spring 2026 at Arctic DTU in Sisimiut and will be attended by 20 international master’s-level students.
Touching the two thawing cores was particularly popular, and as the water kept seeping out of the cores, the materials slowly collapsed in their respective bowls.
The project EduPermaGR is part of the activities of the UArctic Thematic Network on Permafrost.