Photo Credit: Keith Vanderlinde/Antarctic Photo Library

The IceCube neutrino detector laboratory collects the data from the strings of detectors buried in the ice below the South Pole. Winter-over scientists with IceCube and the South Pole Telescope will take part in a 24-hour Webcast in celebration of astronomy around the world.

Two National Science Foundation experiments at South Pole Station will be featured in a live Webcast as part of a special event marking the 2009 International Year of Astronomy .

Scientists spending the winter at the U.S. Antarctic Program's most southerly research station will discuss their work on the South Pole Telescope (SPT) and IceCube neutrino detector . The former is searching the universe to learn more about dark energy, a mysterious phenomenon causing the universe to accelerate.

Located within a cubic kilometer of solid ice, IceCube is another major experiment hoping to learn more about neutrinos, high-energy particles that pass through the Earth from distant corners of the universe following such cosmic cataclysms as exploding stars.

The observatories will be featured with many others in a 24-hour Webcast called "Around the World in 80 Telescopes." The event begins online today at 5 a.m. Eastern time. The South Pole Webcast is scheduled to begin at 3:25 a.m. Eastern time on Saturday, April 4.