A digital magnetic variation station has been installed on Yamal Peninsula's natural ethnographic center in the Gornoknyazevsk village to conduct applied geomagnetic studies near Salekhard, the Yamal-Nenets Autonomous Area press service reported on Thursday.

This is the third such station on Yamal. The first station in Kharasavei opened in 2013 and the second was installed three months ago on Bely Island. Researchers plan to expand the network with magnetometers in Se-Yakha and Nadym.

"The device is used to measure the earth's magnetic field variations. Data will be transmitted to a server via a GPRS network to be processed and provided to relevant organizations and persons," Alexander Amiantov, a research associate at the Pushkov Institute of Terrestrial Magnetism, Ionosphere and Radio Wave Propagation, said.

Data from magnetometers will be posted in the public domain on the Virtualnaya geofizicheskaya laboratoria YaNAO website, which will launch by the year's end. The information will be in demand for the fuel and energy sector for mineral resources exploration and development, as well as public healthcare. The website will also feature polar lights forecasts, which can provide an additional incentive to tourism on Yamal.

The installation of magnetometers is a central stage in the research and education project to create a virtual geophysical laboratory in the Yamalo-Nenets Autonomous Area, which was initiated by Russian geophysicists.

The project is run by the Yamal technology park in conjunction with the Russian Academy of Sciences' Space Research Institute, Pushkov Institute, Arctic and Antarctic Research Institute and Arctic Research Center.