HR: 0800h
AN: C41C-0216    [Abstracts]
TI: Gamma Function Parameterization of Sea-Ice Thickness Distribution
AU: Worby, A P
EM: a.worby@utas.edu.au
AF: Antarctic CRC and Australian Antarctic Division, PO Box 252-80, Hobart, Tas 7001 Australia
AU: * Geiger, C A
EM: cathleen.a.geiger@erdc.usace.army.mil
AF: Cold Regions Research and Engineering Laboratory, 72 Lyme Road, Hanover, NH 03755 United States
AU: Van Woert, M
EM: mvanwoert@natice.noaa.gov
AF: National Ice Center NOAA/NESDIS/OSDPD, FOB#4 Room 2301 4401 Suitland Road, Suitland, MD 20746 United States
AU: Ackley, S F
EM: sackley@pol.net
AF: Clarkson University, 118 W. Castle Lane, San Antonio, TX 78213
AU: DeLiberty, T
EM: tracyd@udel.edu
AF: Department of Geography University of Delaware, Pearson Hall, Room 216, Newark, DE 19716 United States
AB: Antarctic ship observations collected from 1980 to the present are used to test the parameterization of sea-ice thickness distribution using a composite of Incomplete Gamma Function modes. The data are partitioned seasonally and regionally into five sectors around Antarctica. Using a maximum likelihood method, the input data used to construct a probability distribution are sorted to isolate thickness modes with the thinnest incorporating open water fraction. Each mode is mathematically described using the Incomplete Gamma Function with three parameters of shape, scale, and shift. These mathematical variables are related to the shape of the probability for each mode including mode thickness value, thickness range, probability distribution value, and mean thickness. The goal is to provide a simple parametric description of regional thickness distribution that can be imported into numerical models in a concise compact description with a physical relationship relating the mathematical parametric values to the data structure.
DE: 4207 Arctic and Antarctic oceanography
DE: 4215 Climate and interannual variability (3309)
DE: 4227 Diurnal, seasonal, and annual cycles
DE: 3210 Modeling
DE: 1620 Climate dynamics (3309)
SC: Cryosphere [C]
MN: 2004 AGU Fall Meeting