in 1911, the norwegian roald amundsen became the first person ever to reach the south pole, the last region of earth that was still unexplored and uninhabited by humans. in 1959, 12 nations signed the antarctic treaty, pledging to use the region only for peaceful purposes, and particularly for scientific research. today, there are around 80 research stations in the antarctic, used by 4000 scientists frorom all over the world. we wanted to know what it's like to spend months in the cold and ice, and so we headed there, starting at the airport close to the russian polar research station, novolazarevskaya. reporter: approaching antarctica from the air. on board thihis aircraft are scientists from m ten differet countries. they'll be spending the polar summer doing their research here. this y year, the team from belas is especially large. aleksey: belarus has very big program for science. biologists, cosmologists, and geophysicists. now, we're building our station. reporter: india has also sent a large team. members will be making their way to the country's two antarctic research station