HR: 09:00h
AN: C11C-05 INVITED    [Abstracts]
TI: Mapping East Antarctic Snow Accumulation at High Resolution From Space
AU: * Scambos, T
EM: scambos@nsidc.org
AF: National Snow and Ice Data Center, University of Colorado, Boulder, CO 80309-0449, United States
AU: Haran, T
EM: haran@nsidc.org
AF: National Snow and Ice Data Center, University of Colorado, Boulder, CO 80309-0449, United States
AU: Frezzotti, M
EM: frezzotti@casaccia.enea.it
AF: ENEA C.R. Casaccia, Via Anguillarese 301, Roma, 00196, Italy
AU: Jezek, K
EM: jezek.1@osu.edu
AF: Byrd Polar Research Center, Ohio State University, Columbus, OH 54321, United States
AU: Long, D
EM: long@ee.byu.edu
AF: Department of Electrical Engineering, Brigham Young University, Provo, UT 84602, United States
AU: Farness, K
EM: kfn@frosty.mps.ohio-state.edu
AF: Byrd Polar Research Center, Ohio State University, Columbus, OH 54321, United States
AB: Active microwave backscatter measurements from both Radarsat (AMM-1 mapping) and Quikscat show large local variations across the East Antarctic plateau. Comparison of these variations with ground traverse accumulation measurements from ground-penetrating radar and stake measurements shows a consistently high correlation in regions where seasonal melting is absent (generally, in areas >800 m elevation). Backscatter is low in regions of high accumulation and high in regions of lower snowfall. Glaze, or near-zero-accumulation regions have particularly high backscatter. Additional strong correlations are present for local (0.5 km scale) slope in the katabatic wind direction, determined by ICESat and local profiling, and for snow grain size determined from the MODIS Mosaic of Antarctica (MOA) data set. Combined, these data sets show potential for mapping accumulation over large regions of the East Antarctic Plateau at much better resolution (~125-250 m) than presently reported in accumulation compilations. Moreover, the mappings indicate large local variations around surface elevation features. We compare local measurement, the new high-resolution approach to accumulation mapping, and existing recent compiled accumulation data sets over selected regions of the East Antarctic Plateau.
DE: 1218 Mass balance (0762, 1223, 1631, 1836, 1843, 3010, 3322, 4532)
DE: 1863 Snow and ice (0736, 0738, 0776, 1827)
DE: 4540 Ice mechanics and air/sea/ice exchange processes (0700, 0750, 0752, 0754)
SC: Cryosphere [C]
MN: 2007 Fall Meeting