Observationally Constrained Simulations of the Evolution of Polar Snow Using a Multi-Sensor Approach

Funding Program: NASA Interdisciplinary Research in Earth Science
Start Date: 1 September, 2020
End Date: 31 August 2023

Collaborating Institutions: NASA Goddard Space Flight Center (lead), University of Oregon, University of Washington, University of Colorado Boulder

The life cycle of snow is one of the most critical unknowns of the polar climate system. We seek to to fill this urgent gap in our understanding of Earth’s atmosphere-ice-ocean interactions by producing observationally constrained models of all stages of the life cycle of snow over ice sheets. Specifically, we employ observations of snowfall and rainfall rates (CloudSat), surface height change (ICESat, ICESat-2, GNSS reflectometry, AWS), snow thickness (Operation IceBridge snow radar), blowing snow fluxes (ICESat, ICESat-2), albedo and timing of bare ice exposure (MODIS), mass change (GRACE, GRACE-FO), and microwave brightness temperatures (SSM/I, SSM/IS, AMSR-E, AMSR2). Individually, these observations provide mediocre constraints on snow evolution since they target a specific stage of the life cycle; in conjunction, they provide independent controls on the entire system.