The Romanian Scientific Research Expedition to Antarctica – ROICE 2026 marks the continuation of INCDSB’s research tradition on the most isolated continent on the planet.
The ROICE 2026 expedition, carried out between January 24 and February 14, 2026, at the King Sejong Antarctic Station of the Korea Polar Research Institute (KOPRI), located on King George Island in West Antarctica, is the fifth expedition of Romanian researchers to Antarctica, organized by the National Institute for Research and Development in Biological Sciences (INCDSB), this year in partnership with the University of Bucharest.
The expedition brings together complementary expertise and a shared vision of a reality that can no longer be ignored: macrosystemic changes affecting climate, biodiversity, and health have direct consequences for Romania as well. In this context, Antarctica is emerging as a reference natural laboratory, where interdisciplinary research can generate data and conclusions with global impact, as well as concrete applicability for society.
We invite you to discover the objectives of this expedition directly from some of the team members who prepared it, including the four researchers who set off for Antarctica: Iris Tușa, Ovidiu Vrâncianu, Roxana Cristian Vrancianu, and Georgiana Grigore.
Within the scientific program, the team is pursuing three major, mutually complementary directions:
- The influence of climate change on biodiversity – investigating how fragile ecosystems respond to rapid changes in temperature and habitat, as an early indicator of climate transformations.
- Permafrost: from new infectious agents to active pharmaceutical biomolecules – exploring permafrost as an area with a dual stake: on the one hand, emerging biological risks; on the other hand, opportunities to identify biomolecules with pharmacological potential.
- Adaptation of the human body to thermal stress – analysis of physiological responses under extreme conditions, with applications in environmental medicine, prevention, and occupational health.
Through this approach, the expedition delivers a clear message: the major challenges of the present cannot be fully understood from a single perspective. Only through collaboration across disciplines, methodologies, and teams can consistent, transferable, and relevant results be achieved.
The relevance of this endeavor: the data and observations collected in Antarctica can support the shaping of strategic directions in climatology, biosecurity, and public health, as well as the exploration of biomedical solutions inspired by the mechanisms through which life adapts to extreme conditions.
The ROICE 2026 expedition is supported by the National Institute for Research and Development in Biological Sciences (INCDSB) and the University of Bucharest, with the support of the sponsors: BT Production Group, BlueSpace Technology and the Romanian Society of Bioengineering and Biotechnology.
