The daughter of an Afrikaner father and a Zulu mother, Sarah's family fled to England before she's old enough remember. Her childhood is lonely, never fitting in with peers and frequently left home by busy parents. Though she is noted as smart and hard-working, some say she has a "violent passion". Sarah earned her PhD in Neuroscience at the age of 25. Studying the effect of isolation on brain chemistry took her back to South Africa, where she became known in the University of Cape Town for her unconventional experiments, and harassing students and fellow faculty members. Eventually fired for pepper spraying a colleague, Sarah took on private consulting until someone connected her to a multinational expedition. They hired her as the winter director of STAB because of her experiences in leading scientific projects (and no one else wants to be stuck near the South Pole for three months). For Sarah, there's no better place to observe isolation.

-Dell laptop
-Casio mountaineer watch
-Portable brain scanner
-Columbia fur-lined parka
-British and South African passports
-Several boxes of vitamin water

Jerry, or Hsu Po, is born to wealthy Taiwanese entrepreneurs. Since his first IQ test (yielding slightly above average score) at the age of 11, Jerry's made a point to show he's smarter than most people. He got his engineering degree (with rumors of his parents bribing the dean) at the National Taiwan University. Bored working for his mom and dad, Jerry and his buddies founded Brightling Energy Solutions, specializing on alternative power sources. His records as engineer and businessman are both mediocre, but Jerry gained the reputation of a talkative adventurer, claiming to have traveled to every single country (and made friends in all of them). After a decade, Jerry and Brightling got their first big contract: heating up a research station in Antarctica. Jerry saw this as the next big adventure. With his generous discounts and endless pestering, the research commission reluctantly appointed him the assistant director for STAB's first winterover.

-iPad
-Nikon camera
-Electronics tool kit
-Blue Arcteryx ski suit
-Taiwanese flag
-Pink fidget spinner

Reno never had a lot of opportunities growing up. Lower-class income, not particularly book smart and constantly more focused on his social life than his studies. After dropping out of college, he was looking for an easy way to make a buck. There was an opportunity to be a custodian and groundskeeper that paid a ridiculously inflated wage. The catch was, you had to relocate to Antarctica to fill the position and live there for an extended amount of time. Having nothing back home to tie him down, Reno decided to go for it. Now he calls this gigantic refrigerator Home, Sweet Home. Reno is always nice to the people that work there, but can get a little intimidated by them and their staggeringly specialized intelligence from time to time.

1) Skeleton Key

2) Swiss Army Knife

3) Lighter

4) Pack of Cigarettes

5) Smartphone

6) Bottle of Whiskey

Growing up in northern Texas with a mechanic father gave a young Lauren plenty of experience with machinery, and it sparked her interest in it from an early age. Growing up in a small rural town in northern Texas Lauren lovingly refers to as "bumfuck nowhere" gave Lauren an ingrained desire to leave wherever she was and go somewhere new. These two things combined were somewhat at odds with each other, but she eventually got a STEM degree at TCU, Texas Christian University. After that, she travelled where she could, passport in one hand and wrench in the other. Mechanical expertises was a valuable commodity and there was no shortage of work. But eventually, she wanted to do something more. Something greater.

Long story short, Antarctica was very far away, and very exotic. Why not, right? What could possibly go wrong?

Tool Box

Wrench

Welding Torch

Flashlight

Goggles

Radio

From a young age, Ana was always a curious girl. She'd spent most of her time exploring outside instead of playing with dolls. When she was only 7, the family got the chance to move to Canada and settled in Vancouver. Despite the language barrier for the first few years, Ana excelled in school and university, going as far as getting her PhD in Chemistry from the University of British Columbia. During that time she was a TA, and upon graduation she taught at the high school level for a few years before eventually making her way back to UBC to become part of their faculty and research team. When she was in her early 30s, both of her parents died in a car crash during a snowstorm and Ana took a break for a while, traveling to Brazil to be with family after deciding she would have her parents cremated. Some time passed and Ana returned, pouring all of her focus into work. Through the years, she eventually became Assistant Program Director for her department. Since she was well known in the field by then, Ana was later approached regarding the mission to Antarctica. She was reluctant at first, but she figured she might never get the chance to go down there and eventually agreed to go.

A born overachiever, April was working her arse off before she even started primary school, driven by a need to escape the council estate in Southampton where she was born, as well as her large, unruly family. She got into university with ease, choosing to study Biology for her undergrad, later specialising in genetics. Her passion for her chosen field and strong work ethic left her graduating with first class honours, and swiftly completing her PHD in the rather obscure field of genome plasticity in intertidal anemones. By the time she was 26, she was working for the British Antarctic Survey as a postdoctoral research assistant. She made a name for herself quickly as a bit of an up and comer, leading to her being recommended for a position at the STAB as a chance to prove herself. With her career riding on how she performs, April is eager to prove that she has what it takes for a serious career in research.

-Swiss Army Knife - A parting gift from her dad before she left for university, his way of saying ‘I love you please be safe’.
- Her mobile phone, an old Nokia that’s one bad fall away from disintegrating
- A hot water bottle
- An equally battered hp laptop with all the software she needs to process data from her samples and access to numerous genomic databases
- Disposable camera - her mum’s idea, ‘better than taking a fancy digital one that you’ll drop in the sea!’
- Several home genome sequencing kits she keeps in her room as a backup for the more sophisticated analytical equipment in the lab