EarthCODE

Polar Hackathon Success! ​

Polar Hackathon Success! ​

Published: 29.07.2026

The EarthCODE Polar Hackathon, held online in the last week of June 2026, brought together 15 participants from the ESA Polar Science Cluster community. Led by the ESA Polar Cluster and supported by EarthCODE, the event showcased:

  • ESA Antarctic datasets,
  • Polar Cluster data cubes,
  • Workflows for converting datasets into cloud-native formats,
  • Combining datasets into analysis-ready collections, and
  • Integrating these collections into scientific workflows.

All the polar datasets are open and accessible via the EarthCODE Open Science Catalog, with each dataset paired with a guidance notebook to support analysis.

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Figure: Example Jupyter Notebook utilised during the Polar Hackathon to plot basal melting ocean interactions for Antarctica

Hackathon Outcomes ​

Key highlights from the event include:

  • Discussions on the advantages and drawbacks of cloud-optimised datasets and workflows for research purposes.
  • Confirmation of strong interest in building a community around ESA data cubes and related datasets, particularly within the Polar Science Cluster.
  • Participants actively used the EarthCODE Discourse Forum to ask questions, suggest improvements, and troubleshoot technical issues, allowing the EarthCODE team to provide timely support and foster collaboration.
  • The Polar Science Cluster are interested in exploring an Arctic data cube as a next step.

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Figure: Example data plots produced and discussed during the Polar Hackathon, including sea surface salinity, sea ice volume, sea ice thickness, and sea ice concentration around Antarctica

Positive Feedback ​

Attendees highly valued:

  • The Antarctic data cube,
  • Example notebooks,
  • The opportunity to work directly with ESA EarthCODE datasets.

The Polar Cluster will also use the data cube and notebooks produced during the hackathon at the upcoming Polar Cluster co-location meeting and the Scientific Committee on Antarctic Research (SCAR) Open Science Conference in August.

Get Involved! ​

Interested in polar science? The Polar Hackathon materials, including open datasets, tutorials, and notebooks, are freely available to everyone. These resources offer a unique opportunity to:

  • Explore cutting-edge polar science data,
  • Work with reproducible tools and workflows,
  • Engage with a community-driven approach.

Whether you’re a researcher, student, or data enthusiast, these materials are your gateway to discovering Antarctica’s ice shelves, grounding lines, and more. For more information, check out our blog on the Polar Hackathon.

EarthCODE will also be organising similar online hackathons for the ESA Ocean and Carbon Science Clusters, to take place in September/October 2026.

All three online hackathons pave the way for the main event: the EarthCODE Hackathon 2026. This hackathon will be an in-person event in ESA ESRIN running from 30 November to 4 December, bringing together researchers, data scientists, and open-data enthusiasts.

Figure: EarthCODE Hackathon 2026

Look out for more information about the EarthCODE Hackathon 2026 soon!