scholarly journals Retrieval of Snow Depth over Arctic Sea Ice Using a Deep Neural Network

2019 ◽  
Vol 11 (23) ◽  
pp. 2864 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jiping Liu ◽  
Yuanyuan Zhang ◽  
Xiao Cheng ◽  
Yongyun Hu

The accurate knowledge of spatial and temporal variations of snow depth over sea ice in the Arctic basin is important for understanding the Arctic energy budget and retrieving sea ice thickness from satellite altimetry. In this study, we develop and validate a new method for retrieving snow depth over Arctic sea ice from brightness temperatures at different frequencies measured by passive microwave radiometers. We construct an ensemble-based deep neural network and use snow depth measured by sea ice mass balance buoys to train the network. First, the accuracy of the retrieved snow depth is validated with observations. The results show the derived snow depth is in good agreement with the observations, in terms of correlation, bias, root mean square error, and probability distribution. Our ensemble-based deep neural network can be used to extend the snow depth retrieval from first-year sea ice (FYI) to multi-year sea ice (MYI), as well as during the melting period. Second, the consistency and discrepancy of snow depth in the Arctic basin between our retrieval using the ensemble-based deep neural network and two other available retrievals using the empirical regression are examined. The results suggest that our snow depth retrieval outperforms these data sets.

2010 ◽  
Vol 4 (2) ◽  
pp. 641-661 ◽  
Author(s):  
V. Alexandrov ◽  
S. Sandven ◽  
J. Wahlin ◽  
O. M. Johannessen

Abstract. Retrieval of Arctic sea ice thickness from radar altimeter freeboard data, to be provided by CryoSat-2, requires observational data to verify the relation between the two variables. In this study in-situ ice and snow data from 689 observation sites obtained during the Sever expeditions in the 1980s have been used to establish an empirical relation between ice thickness and freeboard. Estimates of mean and variability of snow depth, snow density and ice density were produced based on many field observations, and have been used in the isostatic equilibrium equation to estimate ice thickness as a function of ice freeboard, snow depth and snow/ice density. The accuracy of the ice thickness retrieval has been calculated from the estimated variability in ice and snow parameters and error of ice freeboard measurements. It is found that uncertainties of ice density and freeboard are the major sources of error in ice thickness calculation. For FY ice, retrieval of ≈1.0 m (2.0 m) thickness has an uncertainty of 60% (41%). For MY ice the main uncertainty is ice density error, since the freeboard error is relatively smaller than for FY ice. Retrieval of 2.4 m (3.0 m) thick MY ice has an error of 24% (21%). The freeboard error is ±0.05 m for both the FY and MY ice. If the freeboard error can be reduced to 0.01 m by averaging a large number of measurements from CryoSat, the error in thickness retrieval is reduced to about 32% for a 1.0 m thick FY floe and to about 18% for a 2.3 m thick MY floe. The remaining error is dominated by uncertainty in ice density. Provision of improved ice density data is therefore important for accurate retrieval of ice thickness from CryoSat data.


2020 ◽  
Vol 12 (17) ◽  
pp. 2746
Author(s):  
Yifan Ding ◽  
Xiao Cheng ◽  
Jiping Liu ◽  
Fengming Hui ◽  
Zhenzhan Wang ◽  
...  

The accurate knowledge of variations of melt ponds is important for understanding the Arctic energy budget due to its albedo–transmittance–melt feedback. In this study, we develop and validate a new method for retrieving melt pond fraction (MPF) over Arctic sea ice using all seven spectral bands of MODIS surface reflectance. We construct a robust ensemble-based deep neural network and use in-situ MPF observations collected from multiple sources as the target data to train the network. We examine the potential influence of using sea ice concentration (SIC) from different sources as additional target data (besides MPF) on the MPF retrieval. The results suggest that the inclusion of SIC has a minor impact on MPF retrieval. Based on this, we create a new MPF data from 2000 to 2019 (the longest data in our knowledge). The validation shows that our new MPF data is in good agreement with the observations. We further compare the new MPF dataset with the previously published MPF datasets. It is found that the evolution of the new MPF is similar to previous MPF data throughout the melting season, but the new MPF data is in relatively better agreement with the observations in terms of correlations and root mean squared errors (RMSE), and also has the smallest value in the first half of the melting season.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alex Cabaj ◽  
Paul Kushner ◽  
Alek Petty

<p><span>Snow on Arctic sea ice plays many, sometimes contrasting roles in Arctic climate feedbacks. During the sea ice growth season, the presence of snow on sea ice can enhance ice growth by increasing the sea ice albedo, or conversely, inhibit sea ice growth by insulating the ice from the cold atmosphere. Furthermore, estimates of snow depth on Arctic sea ice are also a key input for deriving sea ice thickness from altimetry measurements, such as satellite lidar altimetry measurements from ICESat-2. Due to the logistical challenges of making measurements in as remote a region as the Arctic, snow depth on Arctic sea ice is difficult to observationally constrain.<br><br>The NASA Eulerian Snow On Sea Ice Model (NESOSIM) can be used to provide snow depth and density estimates over Arctic sea ice with pan-Arctic coverage within a relatively simple framework. The latest version of NESOSIM, version 1.1, is a 2-layer model with simple representations of the processes of accumulation, wind packing, loss due to blowing snow, and redistribution due to sea ice motion. Relative to version 1.0, NESOSIM 1.1 features an extended model domain, and reanalysis snowfall input scaled to observed snowfall retrieved from CloudSat satellite radar reflectivity measurements.<br><br>In this work, we present a systematic calibration, and an accompanying estimate in the uncertainty of the free parameters in NESOSIM, targeting airborne snow radar measurements from Operation IceBridge. We further investigate uncertainties in snow depth and the resulting uncertainties in derived sea ice thickness from ICESat-2 altimetry measurements using NESOSIM snow depths.</span></p>


2020 ◽  
pp. 024
Author(s):  
Rym Msadek ◽  
Gilles Garric ◽  
Sara Fleury ◽  
Florent Garnier ◽  
Lauriane Batté ◽  
...  

L'Arctique est la région du globe qui s'est réchauffée le plus vite au cours des trente dernières années, avec une augmentation de la température de surface environ deux fois plus rapide que pour la moyenne globale. Le déclin de la banquise arctique observé depuis le début de l'ère satellitaire et attribué principalement à l'augmentation de la concentration des gaz à effet de serre aurait joué un rôle important dans cette amplification des températures au pôle. Cette fonte importante des glaces arctiques, qui devrait s'accélérer dans les décennies à venir, pourrait modifier les vents en haute altitude et potentiellement avoir un impact sur le climat des moyennes latitudes. L'étendue de la banquise arctique varie considérablement d'une saison à l'autre, d'une année à l'autre, d'une décennie à l'autre. Améliorer notre capacité à prévoir ces variations nécessite de comprendre, observer et modéliser les interactions entre la banquise et les autres composantes du système Terre, telles que l'océan, l'atmosphère ou la biosphère, à différentes échelles de temps. La réalisation de prévisions saisonnières de la banquise arctique est très récente comparée aux prévisions du temps ou aux prévisions saisonnières de paramètres météorologiques (température, précipitation). Les résultats ayant émergé au cours des dix dernières années mettent en évidence l'importance des observations de l'épaisseur de la glace de mer pour prévoir l'évolution de la banquise estivale plusieurs mois à l'avance. Surface temperatures over the Arctic region have been increasing twice as fast as global mean temperatures, a phenomenon known as arctic amplification. One main contributor to this polar warming is the large decline of Arctic sea ice observed since the beginning of satellite observations, which has been attributed to the increase of greenhouse gases. The acceleration of Arctic sea ice loss that is projected for the coming decades could modify the upper level atmospheric circulation yielding climate impacts up to the mid-latitudes. There is considerable variability in the spatial extent of ice cover on seasonal, interannual and decadal time scales. Better understanding, observing and modelling the interactions between sea ice and the other components of the climate system is key for improved predictions of Arctic sea ice in the future. Running operational-like seasonal predictions of Arctic sea ice is a quite recent effort compared to weather predictions or seasonal predictions of atmospheric fields like temperature or precipitation. Recent results stress the importance of sea ice thickness observations to improve seasonal predictions of Arctic sea ice conditions during summer.


2021 ◽  
Vol 9 (7) ◽  
pp. 755
Author(s):  
Kangkang Jin ◽  
Jian Xu ◽  
Zichen Wang ◽  
Can Lu ◽  
Long Fan ◽  
...  

Warm current has a strong impact on the melting of sea ice, so clarifying the current features plays a very important role in the Arctic sea ice coverage forecasting study field. Currently, Arctic acoustic tomography is the only feasible method for the large-range current measurement under the Arctic sea ice. Furthermore, affected by the high latitudes Coriolis force, small-scale variability greatly affects the accuracy of Arctic acoustic tomography. However, small-scale variability could not be measured by empirical parameters and resolved by Regularized Least Squares (RLS) in the inverse problem of Arctic acoustic tomography. In this paper, the convolutional neural network (CNN) is proposed to enhance the prediction accuracy in the Arctic, and especially, Gaussian noise is added to reflect the disturbance of the Arctic environment. First, we use the finite element method to build the background ocean model. Then, the deep learning CNN method constructs the non-linear mapping relationship between the acoustic data and the corresponding flow velocity. Finally, the simulation result shows that the deep learning convolutional neural network method being applied to Arctic acoustic tomography could achieve 45.87% accurate improvement than the common RLS method in the current inversion.


2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
R. L. Tilling ◽  
A. Ridout ◽  
A. Shepherd

Abstract. Timely observations of sea ice thickness help us to understand Arctic climate, and can support maritime activities in the Polar Regions. Although it is possible to calculate Arctic sea ice thickness using measurements acquired by CryoSat-2, the latency of the final release dataset is typically one month, due to the time required to determine precise satellite orbits. We use a new fast delivery CryoSat-2 dataset based on preliminary orbits to compute Arctic sea ice thickness in near real time (NRT), and analyse this data for one sea ice growth season from October 2014 to April 2015. We show that this NRT sea ice thickness product is of comparable accuracy to that produced using the final release CryoSat-2 data, with an average thickness difference of 5 cm, demonstrating that the satellite orbit is not a critical factor in determining sea ice freeboard. In addition, the CryoSat-2 fast delivery product also provides measurements of Arctic sea ice thickness within three days of acquisition by the satellite, and a measurement is delivered, on average, within 10, 7 and 6 km of each location in the Arctic every 2, 14 and 28 days respectively. The CryoSat-2 NRT sea ice thickness dataset provides an additional constraint for seasonal predictions of Arctic climate change, and will allow industries such as tourism and transport to navigate the polar oceans with safety and care.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alek Petty ◽  
Nicole Keeney ◽  
Alex Cabaj ◽  
Paul Kushner ◽  
Nathan Kurtz ◽  
...  

<div> <div> <div> <div> <p>National Aeronautics and Space Administration's (NASA's) Ice, Cloud, and land Elevation Satellite‐ 2 (ICESat‐2) mission was launched in September 2018 and is now providing routine, very high‐resolution estimates of surface height/type (the ATL07 product) and freeboard (the ATL10 product) across the Arctic and Southern Oceans. In recent work we used snow depth and density estimates from the NASA Eulerian Snow on Sea Ice Model (NESOSIM) together with ATL10 freeboard data to estimate sea ice thickness across the entire Arctic Ocean. Here we provide an overview of updates made to both the underlying ATL10 freeboard product and the NESOSIM model, and the subsequent impacts on our estimates of sea ice thickness including updated comparisons to the original ICESat mission and ESA’s CryoSat-2. Finally we compare our Arctic ice thickness estimates from the 2018-2019 and 2019-2020 winters and discuss possible causes of these differences based on an analysis of atmospheric data (ERA5), ice drift (NSIDC) and ice type (OSI SAF).</p> </div> </div> </div> </div>


Sensors ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 20 (24) ◽  
pp. 7011
Author(s):  
Feng Xiao ◽  
Fei Li ◽  
Shengkai Zhang ◽  
Jiaxing Li ◽  
Tong Geng ◽  
...  

Satellite altimeters can be used to derive long-term and large-scale sea ice thickness changes. Sea ice thickness retrieval is based on measurements of freeboard, and the conversion of freeboard to thickness requires knowledge of the snow depth and snow, sea ice, and sea water densities. However, these parameters are difficult to be observed concurrently with altimeter measurements. The uncertainties in these parameters inevitably cause uncertainties in sea ice thickness estimations. This paper introduces a new method based on least squares adjustment (LSA) to estimate Arctic sea ice thickness with CryoSat-2 measurements. A model between the sea ice freeboard and thickness is established within a 5 km × 5 km grid, and the model coefficients and sea ice thickness are calculated using the LSA method. Based on the newly developed method, we are able to derive estimates of the Arctic sea ice thickness for 2010 through 2019 using CryoSat-2 altimetry data. Spatial and temporal variations of the Arctic sea ice thickness are analyzed, and comparisons between sea ice thickness estimates using the LSA method and three CryoSat-2 sea ice thickness products (Alfred Wegener Institute (AWI), Centre for Polar Observation and Modelling (CPOM), and NASA Goddard Space Flight Centre (GSFC)) are performed for the 2018–2019 Arctic sea ice growth season. The overall differences of sea ice thickness estimated in this study between AWI, CPOM, and GSFC are 0.025 ± 0.640 m, 0.143 ± 0.640 m, and −0.274 ± 0.628 m, respectively. Large differences between the LSA and three products tend to appear in areas covered with thin ice due to the limited accuracy of CryoSat-2 over thin ice. Spatiotemporally coincident Operation IceBridge (OIB) thickness values are also used for validation. Good agreement with a difference of 0.065 ± 0.187 m is found between our estimates and the OIB results.


2020 ◽  
Vol 14 (4) ◽  
pp. 1325-1345 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yinghui Liu ◽  
Jeffrey R. Key ◽  
Xuanji Wang ◽  
Mark Tschudi

Abstract. Sea ice is a key component of the Arctic climate system, and has impacts on global climate. Ice concentration, thickness, and volume are among the most important Arctic sea ice parameters. This study presents a new record of Arctic sea ice thickness and volume from 1984 to 2018 based on an existing satellite-derived ice age product. The relationship between ice age and ice thickness is first established for every month based on collocated ice age and ice thickness from submarine sonar data (1984–2000) and ICESat (2003–2008) and an empirical ice growth model. Based on this relationship, ice thickness is derived for the entire time period from the weekly ice age product, and the Arctic monthly sea ice volume is then calculated. The ice-age-based thickness and volume show good agreement in terms of bias and root-mean-square error with submarine, ICESat, and CryoSat-2 ice thickness, as well as ICESat and CryoSat-2 ice volume, in February–March and October–November. More detailed comparisons with independent data from Envisat for 2003 to 2010 and CryoSat-2 from CPOM, AWI, and NASA GSFC (Goddard Space Flight Center) for 2011 to 2018 show low bias in ice-age-based thickness. The ratios of the ice volume uncertainties to the mean range from 21 % to 29 %. Analysis of the derived data shows that the ice-age-based sea ice volume exhibits a decreasing trend of −411 km3 yr−1 from 1984 to 2018, stronger than the trends from other datasets. Of the factors affecting the sea ice volume trends, changes in sea ice thickness contribute more than changes in sea ice area, with a contribution of at least 80 % from changes in sea ice thickness from November to May and nearly 50 % in August and September, while less than 30 % is from changes in sea ice area in all months.


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