In the stamp series "Research, Innovation, Technology", the Norwegian Mail (Posten) and the Research Council of Norway present discoveries and inventions that have provided crucial new knowledge and important advancements.
This year's two releases in the series are the Bjerknes Centre and the national research project Nansen Legacy.
The Bjerknes Centre stamp illustrates how the extension of the Gulf Stream, the Norwegian Current, transports warm water northward along the coast of Norway. The design is based on a map created by the oceanographers Bjørn Helland-Hansen and Fridtjof Nansen in 1909.
The old map still provides a relevant overview of surface currents in the Nordic Seas.
"They were not dumb, those guys. Over the last hundred years we have added more current arrows, but the main features are spot on," says Marius Årthun.
Årthun is an oceanographer and Gulf Stream researcher at the Geophysical Institute at the University of Bergen and the Bjerknes Centre. He is also associated with the Nansen Legacy, where the Bjerknes Centre participates through its partner institutions the University of Bergen, the Norwegian Institute of Marine Research, and the Nansen Environmental and Remote Sensing Center.
In the Nansen Legacy Stamp, Fridtjof Nansen's face is illustrated as a collection of ice floes. Both stamps have been made by the renowned designer Enzo Finger, based on ideas from the Bjerknes Centre and Frida Anneke Cnossen at the University of Tromsø.
Marius Årthun is excited about the result.
"This year my friends will get Christmas cards featuring the Gulf Stream," promises the oceanographer.
Read more about the new stamps at Posten and the Research Council.