Investigators from a number of countries have been studying the ice community and experimental information is now available from a number of geographic areas. This includes ecological data as well as community and species specific physiological information. The literature on ice biota is scattered, being found in scientific journals, research and technical reports, symposia proceedings, M. S. theses and Ph.D. dissertations, meeting abstracts, and books on topics ranging from algal ecology to regional oceanography. Much of the material has not been published and some is available only in proprietry or difficult to obtain reports. The purpose of this book is to bring the data and references together in one place and to provide state of the art information on these little known, but ecologically important, polar communities.