HR: 1350h
AN: U23C-1455    [Abstracts]
TI: Thirty Years of Data Management for Earth Observations at the National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC)
AU: * Barry, R G
EM: rbarry@nsidc.org
AF: National Snow and Ice Data Center, CIRES, University of Colorado, UCB 449, Boulder, CO 80309, United States
AU: Weaver, R L
EM: weaverr@nsidc.org
AF: National Snow and Ice Data Center, CIRES, University of Colorado, UCB 449, Boulder, CO 80309, United States
AU: Armstrong, R L
EM: rlax@nsidc.org
AF: National Snow and Ice Data Center, CIRES, University of Colorado, UCB 449, Boulder, CO 80309, United States
AU: Fetterer, F
EM: fetterer@nsidc.org
AF: National Snow and Ice Data Center, CIRES, University of Colorado, UCB 449, Boulder, CO 80309, United States
AB: Over the past 30 years the National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC) has managed data in a way that directly or indirectly supports earth observations. NSIDC's Distributed Active Archive Center (DAAC) supports the cryospheric missions of the NASA Earth Observing System's satellites. The new Cooperative Data and Information System (CADIS), joint with NCAR and UCAR, supports the (largely) NSF funded Arctic Observing Network (AON). Indirectly, NSIDC supports the Global Climate Observing System and other Earth monitoring efforts by archiving data that contribute to their missions. Some simple truths about observing systems emerge from our long history of storing and serving their data. They include: New instruments have to be "backward compatible" with old. A few long, continuous, records are at least as valuable as numerous sporadic new short records from a number of PIs or satellite programs, even if the short records are more precise. International collaborations are essential for building networks and for establishing data sharing protocols. Examples of currently active NSIDC affiliations include International Polar Year Data Coordination Service of ICSU (International Council for Science), the International Permafrost Association, the World Glacier Monitoring Service, and the Joint WMO-IOC Commission for Oceanography and Maritime Meteorology (JCOMM) for the Global Sea Ice Data Bank. While some observations are useful on their own (like sea ice or snow extent) many are only informative when combined with other like or contrasting observations in some way. It is difficult to get funding for developing higher level or integrative products like atlases, climatologies, near-real-time data streams, or even data on the same grid or in the same format, but these are some of NSIDC's most used data sets. They include the first global assembly of data and information on frozen ground (CAPS), Environmental Atlases for arctic meteorology, oceanography, and sea ice; and passive microwave gridded time series products from the ESMR, SMMR, SSMI, and AMSR-E sensors. Strategic IT decisions impact the cost and effectiveness of systems for managing and distributing observing system data. The challenge to IT managers is the continuing need to drive costs downward yet continue the same level of service in an ever changing technology and user requirements world. The NSIDC DAAC EOSDIS Core System has evolved over the past 10 years and will no doubt change even more in the near future. The Global Land Ice Measurements from Space (GLIMS) project exemplifies the effective linking of older limited-coverage IGY-era paper maps to a modern geospatial data base with web-based interactive maps allowing access to a global satellite data set to monitor the world's glaciers. The outgrowth of these projects is a strong respect for the needed scientist-to-scientist communication and coordination as well as innovative IT tools. In the coming decades we expect reinforcement of these trends, increasing emphasis on multi-sensor products and multi-disciplinary data sets, all in a rapidly changing IT environment.
UR: http://nsidc.org
DE: 0720 Glaciers
DE: 0736 Snow (1827, 1863)
DE: 0750 Sea ice (4540)
DE: 0776 Glaciology (1621, 1827, 1863)
DE: 1621 Cryospheric change (0776)
SC: Union [U]
MN: 2007 Fall Meeting