Ice

Ice

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SLAP Campaigns

SLAP Data

Data Download

The geolocated radiances and geophysical parameters collected by SLAP are posted on the page for each field campaign as they become available. Please explore the list of field campaigns to learn about the flights from each campaign and download SLAP data.

For older versions of SLAP data, the entire published data archive can also be found on Box.

Work With Us

~ CIVIL SERVANT POSITION IN SEA ICE REMOTE SENSING AVAILABLE ~

USA JOBS POSTING: https://www.usajobs.gov/GetJob/ViewDetails/602371800
APPLICATION PERIOD: 06/04/2021 to 06/08/2021

Field Campaigns

MOSAiC

September 2019

MOSAiC (Multidisciplinary drifting Observatory for the Study of Arctic Climate) is the largest year round polar expedition to the central Arctic in history. In September 2019, the German research vessel Polarstern set sail for the central Arctic and began a coordinated and highly detailed set of observations of the Arctic climate system. MOSAiC is an international effort led by the Alfred Wegener Institute (AWI), Helmholtz Centre for Polar and Marine Research and involves hundreds of researchers from 20 countries.

88south

The 88-South Antarctic Traverse

NASA cryospheric scientist Kelly Brunt and other members of the NASA Cryospheric Science Laboratory endure low temperatures, high winds and high altitude to conduct the 88-South Traverse: a 470-mile expedition in one of the most barren and remote landscapes on Earth, towards validation of the ICESat-2 satellite.

SnowEx Campaign 2017

SnowEx

February 2017

SnowEx

Under the leadership of Dr. Edward Kim, the 2017 SnowEx airborne and field campaign was carried out in Colorado during February 6-24. For more information please visit https://snow.nasa.gov/snowex.

Space Missions

ICESat-2

The Ice, Cloud and land Elevation Satellite-2, or ICESat-2, will measure the height of a changing Earth – one laser pulse at a time, 10,000 laser pulses a second. Launched in 2018, ICESat-2 will carry a laser altimeter that detects individual photons, allowing scientists to measure the elevation of ice sheets, sea ice, forests and more in unprecedented detail.

Website:

jpss

Joint Polar Satellite System (JPSS)

The restructured Joint Polar Satellite System (formerly -- National Polar-orbiting Environmental Satellite System (NPOESS)), will address NOAA’s requirements to provide global environmental data necessary for NOAA’s missions to monitor the earth, manage resources, support the Nation’s economy, and protect lives and property. source: NOAA

Website:

Joint Polar Satellite System

The Surface Water Ocean Topography (SWOT) mission

The Surface Water Ocean Topography mission brings together two communities focused on a better understanding of the world's oceans and its terrestrial surface waters. The SWOT Satellite Mission and its wide-swath altimetry technology is a means of completely covering the world's oceans and freshwater bodies with repeated elevation measurements.

Research Areas

Outreach

postcard

Operation IceBridge Postcards

Send a "note from the field" with postcards featuring images from Operation IceBridge, NASA's six-year airborne mission to monitor Earth's polar ice sheets, glaciers, and sea ice. Display the front of the cards to showcase spectacular images and visualizations from the mission. Turn the cards over to read factoids and learn about the ice at Earth's polar regions.

Website:

Operation IceBridge

peng

ICESat-2 Outreach

ICESat-2 is a satellite mission launched in September 2018. ICESat-2 uses green lasers to measure the height of Earth's ice-covered regions to track melting and other changes. From space, it will also measure the height of other features of our planet, including land, trees and shrubs, water and even buildings. Visit ICESat-2’s Funzone for videos, hands-on activities, interactives, and citizen science opportunities.

Website:

ICESat-2 Outreach

beautiful earth

Beautiful Earth

Beautiful Earth is a unique education experience for people of all ages that combines live music, a multi-media presentation of NASA visualizations, NASA scientist and Native American perspectives of the Earth and its cryosphere, and hands-on workshops at partner museums across the U.S.

Data Files

A database of daily Lagrangian Arctic sea ice parcel drift tracks with coincident ice and atmospheric conditions to study the fate of sea ice in the ‘New Arctic’

Since the early 2000s, sea ice has experienced an increased rate of decline in thickness and extent and is transitioning to a seasonal ice cover. This shift to thinner, seasonal ice in the ‘New Arctic’ is accompanied by a reshuffling of energy flows at the surface.

AIRS-Derived Turbulent Fluxes for the Northwater Polynya

Polar Altimetry

The Cryosphere Lab at NASA/GSFC has processed satellite radar and aircraft laser altimetry over the continental ice sheets and surrounding sea ice to calculate surface elevations.

Instruments

swesarr

Snow Water Equivalent SAR and Radiometer (SWESARR)

The Snow Water Equivalent Synthetic Aperture Radar and Radiometer (SWESARR) is a new instrument designed to measure the water content in a snowpack. The instrument, developed at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, uses active and passive microwave sensors to map the radio frequency emissions of the snowpack, which can then be turned into a measurement of snow water equivalent.

Organizations:

SLAP Thermal Infrared

SLAP’s thermal infra-red (TIR) sensor is used to estimate the physical temperature of each footprint on the ground during a science flight. This information is needed by many algorithms—for example, the L2 passive soil moisture algorithm. SLAP uses the CTF-SF15-C1 made by Micro-Epsilon for this measurement.

Organizations:

SLAP Radar

The radar in SLAP utilizes simple scatterometer design with single string used as transmitter and simultaneous V and H chains used as receivers. It provides VV, HH, VH and HV polarization channels. It operated at radio frequency of 1.2625 GHz with flexibility for adjusting to RFI frequencies. It transmits power of 50 W with duty cycle of 0.2%. Internal hot and ambient loads, external anechoic foam and cold sky were used for calibration purpose.

Organizations:

Models

LIS: Land Information System Software

The Land Information System (LIS) is a high performance land surface modeling and data assimilation software framework, that supports GSFC's Land Data Assimilation Systems.

https://lis.gsfc.nasa.gov