YELLOWKNIFE - This summer, NASA researchers and scientists will be setting up shop in Yellowknife for about a month to pull data out of the air.

"We will be observing the effects of boreal forest fires on the atmosphere," said Anne Thompson, a professor with the Pennsylvania State University meteorology department.

On a larger scale, ARCTAS, or the Arctic Research of the Composition of the Troposphere from Aircraft and Satellites, is a NASA earth science project that will be studying how our local airborne particles are affecting the climate here and all around the world.

Thompson and NASA Earth Science project manager Michael Gaunce were both in Yellowknife last week to meet with airport manager Steve Loutitt and select a location for their base. Thompson said one of the most important aspects of their work is the manner in which it will be performed.

The team of around 15 to 20 people will be bringing a trailer and an airplane full of sensitive instruments to Yellowknife some time in June. They will be taking data from the ground via the trailer, the "troposphere" (the bottom level of the atmosphere) via the airplane, and from space using a network of satellites. Thompson said such a comprehensive look has never before been taken at the Arctic air. Both she and Gaunce said the last time anything similar happened in our area was the early 1990s.

"We have much more advanced instrumentation now," Thompson said.

On the ARCTAS website, it mentions that the project is part of a larger International Polar Year effort called POLARCAT, which is another acronym of even more epic proportions. It's a complex mission, however at its most simple, it is a study of where our particulate matter goes when it leaves our city, region, territory, country and even our hemisphere. In other words, they are following trails of pollution.

The POLARCAT website states that the isolated Arctic region creates a natural laboratory where our emissions can be studied in a relatively stable environment. But according to the world of science, even our airborne particles are jaded world travelers compared to what was previously believed.

Thompson said research has proven that pollution is not localized.

"Nobody owns pollution anymore," she said, adding that scientists are now seeing that that pollution can come from another continent.

It all depends on where the wind blows.

"We are also able to fingerprint pollution in an area," she said.

With different emissions in different parts of the world, she said even a particular city can produce a distinct cloud of smog that is capable of blowing halfway around the world, and staying relatively recognizable to scientists for almost a week before it just mixes with the local emissions.

While Yellowknife isn't the centre of the pollution universe, according to the ARCTAS site, the Arctic air gathers significant emissions from the massive tracts of "boreal" or northern region forests which burn pretty much annually. The North is also a stomping ground for pollutants blown in from other continents, that tend to stick around. This phenomenon is known as "Arctic haze."

With our sensitive environment being very vulnerable to the changes in the climate in the last 20 years, it's a place that the project is hoping will shed more light on the causes and effects of climate change.

"We are hoping to answer some basic chemistry and climate questions," Thompson said.

In choosing their location, Gaunce also said that while the right geographic conditions for study are fine and dandy, it also came down to some good old fashioned Yellowknife hospitality.

"There was good local response here. We need the support of the community to do our work," he said.