HR: 0800h
AN: S41A-0244    [Abstracts]
TI: Seismic Observations in Extreme Cold Environments: IRIS Instrumentation Takes to the Cold
AU: * Fowler, J
EM: jim@iris.edu
AF: IRIS PASSCAL Instrument Center, 100 East Road Tech Industrial Park, Socorro, NM 87801, United States
AU: Anderson, K R
EM: kent@iris.edu
AF: IRIS Global Seismographic Network, 100 East Road Tech Industrial Park, Socorro, NM 87801, United States
AU: Parker, T
EM: tim@passcal.nmt.edu
AF: IRIS PASSCAL Instrument Center, 100 East Road Tech Industrial Park, Socorro, NM 87801, United States
AU: Beaudoin, B C
EM: bruce@passcal.nmt.edu
AF: IRIS PASSCAL Instrument Center, 100 East Road Tech Industrial Park, Socorro, NM 87801, United States
AU: Bonnett, B
EM: brian@passcal.nmt.edu
AF: IRIS PASSCAL Instrument Center, 100 East Road Tech Industrial Park, Socorro, NM 87801, United States
AB: In 2006, the National Science Foundation (NSF) awarded a Major Research Initiative (MRI) grant to UNAVCO and the Incorporated Research Institutions for Seismology (IRIS) to develop a power and communications system that will improve remote autonomous geophysical observations in the polar environments. Currently in the second year of a three year program, field developments and designs have proven that a high-quality seismic station can be operated and maintained in an extremely cold environment utilizing recent manufacturing breakthroughs in light weight battery designs and insulating materials. With modern, state-of-the-art seismic equipment now being designed to operate at very low power in more extreme temperature ranges, we have the opportunity to exploit new opportunities in polar environments with increased reliability and reduced logistics requirements on the polar field support agencies (primarily, the NSF's Office of Polar Programs). As a result of intermediate results and successes with the autonomous station design, NSF has awarded another grant to IRIS to begin to establish a pool of seismic instrumentation and station infrastructure packages designed to operate PASSCAL experiments in the polar-regions. Procurement has begun on this new pool and support of field operations have already begun on projects in Greenland (Helheim Glacier) and Antarctica (Gamburtsev Mountains Project – AGAP; Polenet; and a tomographic study of Mt Erebus). Along with the equipment, PASSCAL has now established a dedicated staff to polar projects to further enhance the support and quality of the data return for these challenging projects.
DE: 0794 Instruments and techniques
DE: 7294 Seismic instruments and networks (0935, 3025)
SC: Seismology [S]
MN: 2007 Fall Meeting