New research stations will open in the village of Sabetta of the Yamal-Nenets Autonomous Area and on Bely Island in the Kara Sea in 2018, Vladimir Bogdanov, director of the Institute of Plant and Animal Ecology of the Russian Academy of Sciences Ural Branch told TASS.

"As far as the plans for next year are concerned, we will continue to research the biodiversity to understand what is happening," said Bogdanov, a corresponding member of the Russian Academy of Sciences. "We also hope that next year the team of the Institute of Plant and Animal Ecology of the Ural Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences will work together with the Science and Innovations Department of the Yamal-Nenets Autonomous Area at two new field stations near Sabetta, where the LNG transport terminal is now based, and on Bely Island, which has been cleared of rubbish."

He said the institute researchers had been working in the Arctic region for over 70 years at the research station in Labytnangi, and also at the Yerkuta field station in southern Yamal for two decades.

"Our stations mostly focus on estimating the ecosystems' biodiversity and its dynamics, studying fish stock and reindeer breeding grounds, the environmental impact of gas and oil field development projects, and also climate and radio-biological research," Bogdanov said.

Earlier, Valery Charushin, Russian Academy of Sciences vice president and chairman of its Ural Branch, said that the Academy's Ural institutes were pursuing at least 50 environmental, seismological, economic, materials research, and legal projects related to the Arctic. For this purpose, a special program, The Arctic, has been established led by the research board.