Properties of snow overlying the sea ice off East Antarctica in late winter, 2007

Abstract

The properties of snow on East Antarctic sea ice off Wilkes Land were examined during the Sea Ice Physics and Ecosystem Experiment (SIPEX)

Satellite Remote Sensing of Snow Depth on Antarctic Sea Ice: An Inter-Comparison of Two Empirical Approaches

“…This is the main reason for a snow cover on Antarctic sea ice, which is not only thicker than in the Arctic but also more heterogeneous [3]. Alternating phases of warm air intrusions and cold spells result in a snow cover with a complex vertically layered structure [2][3][4][5].…”

Introduction: SIPEX-2: A study of sea-ice physical, biogeochemical and ecosystem processes off East Antarctica during spring 2012

“…Historically, the sea ice off East Antarctica has been considered to be relatively thin (Worby et al, 1998(Worby et al, , 2008 (although large thicknesses have been estimated in coastal fast ice in places ) -with a relatively thin snow cover (Massom et al, 2001;Toyota et al, 2011). While snow insulates the sea-ice surface from the atmosphere to limit thermodynamic ice growth, high snow accumulation can result in surface suppression that induces surface flooding and subsequent ice thickening by snowice formation.…”

The IPY 2007–2008 data legacy – creating open data from IPY publications

“…WorldCat -the world's largest network of library content and services -incorporates the content of all repositories, catalogues and databases which can be utilized following the OAI-PMH (Open Archives Initiative -Protocol for Metadata Harvesting) standard and thus also includes the PANGAEA content with its IPY collection. Last but not least, Elsevier journals display a data reference and a map as soon as article-related data are archived in PANGAEA (see, e.g., doi:10.1016/j.dsr2.2010.12.002; Toyota et al, 2011a). Efforts to make the PANGAEA content available via the GCMD and in particular via the specific IPY and Arctic/Antarctic portals are in progress.…”

“…The problems most often encountered are the following: (1) project databases are not maintained after the project ends and data links thus get 404 errors; (2) the actual data are nowhere to be found, i.e. huge amounts of metadata are not backed by data; (3) the data have not been quality checked, abbreviations are not explained and/or units are missing; (4) the data are not geocoded,; (5) data and metadata are stored in different files, and considerable effort has to be put into combining both to make sense of the data; (6) file-based archives do not harmonize contents, which significantly complicates the integration of data from different sources; (7) the data are hidden in a map or figure, and the source data are not accessible; (8) data centres tend to be focused on a very specific discipline, which hinders interdisciplinary work; (9) finding data is hard and tedious, even with powerful search engines (Parsons et al, 2011); and, lastly, (10) the data are not freely available. The so-called IPY-DIS (http://ipydis.org) had the intention of centralizing and improving this situation (Parsons et al, 2011).…”

“…The IPY was in-A. Driemel et al: IPY data legacy tended to help deepen the understanding of polar environmental change and its impact on society, which requires the creative use of a myriad of data from many disciplines (Parsons et al, 2011). However, despite all the data collected, and plans of a full-time, professional data unit (IPY-DIS -IPY data and information service), in the end no central archive or portal was funded for IPY data (Parsons et al, 2011).…”