Thinking in terms of heat absorption, wouldn’t black or darker colours be more appropriate, or at those temperatures would such an effect be too minimal to even consider?
Is it therefore for visibility, or is it just the colour of the uniform of the researchers/scientists?
Many thanks! <3
In: 809
Antarctic operative here – Yes, it’s for visibility as several other people have said.
You mention heat absorption; at extremely high (or low) latitudes, there’s actually not a lot of sun. The station I go to barely gets above +2°C in the Austral summer (i.e. January). In the winter it’s -40°C. We do get blue sky days, but there’s almost no heat to absorb. [This page](https://pages.mtu.edu/~raman/SilverI/MiTEP_ESI-2/Solar_energy_and_latitude.html) has a pretty good diagram explaining how the sun’s light and heat is spread over such a large area at the poles.
A lot of science over the years has gone into the construction and ways to wear polar clothing, with new pieces trialled every few years from different manufacturers. The various polar institutes around the world really know what works and what doesn’t.
(Edit: Corrected high vs low latitudes)
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