Czech-built Antarctic polar station completed

Scientists from Masaryk University in Brno have announced that the Czech-built Antarctic polar station on James Ross Island has been completed. The station, called after the 19th-century Brno-based geneticist and meteorologist Johan Gregor Mendel, will be ready to welcome the first expedition at the start of the polar summer in December. It is expected to host climatologists, biologists and geologists who will study climate change and the origin of the so-called Antarctic "oases", areas where the glacier had receded and allowed some simple forms of life to inhabit the location.