Polar Bear Researcher Suspended, Spurring Alarm

Stephanie Pappas, LiveScience Senior WriterDate: 29 July 2011 Time: 05:33 PM ET

Polar bears depend on sea ice for hunting, breeding and denning. The bears wait for seals to pop up through breathing holes in the ice, but since the ice is melting earlier and earlier in the year, polar bears are shifting their habitat to land and water, and may be missing out on hunting opportunities.
CREDIT: USGS View full size image

The suspension of a wildlife biologist known for his research on drowned polar bears is causing confusion and alarm in scientific circles.

Charles Monnett, a wildlife biologist with the U.S. Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, Regulation and Enforcement, (BOEMRE) was placed on administrative leave on July 18 pending the conclusion of an Inspector General investigation into "integrity issues," according to the suspension order.

Monnett had been questioned by the Interior Department's Office of the Inspector General (OIG) in February about a 2006 research article published in the journal Polar Biology, in which he reported observations of drowned polar bears in the Beaufort Sea. In the article, Monnett and his co-authors speculate that bear drownings could increase if continued climate change resulted in less ice cover in the Arctic. The work was cited in the 2006 Al Gore documentary film, "An Inconvenient Truth." [Gallery: Polar Bears Swimming in the Arctic]

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