Topic 2g Part 1: Snow On Sea Ice
In this video, Dr Rosemary Willat and Robbie Mallett onboard MOSAiC simulate an ice melt event using a heat gun. The aim of the experiment was to see what happens to snow on sea ice when it melts and then re-freezes. This was part of an effort to get a better understanding of melt events like this will affect the measurements taken from satellite.
Snow on sea ice is an essential part of the climate system. Snow and ice have a high reflexivity (high albedo). However, in warmer months snow melts and collects in basins or dips on the surface forming melt ponds. These melt ponds have a low albedo as they reflect less heat from the sun, and in turn they heat up surrounding ice and create more melt. This means that they play an important role in the decay of sea ice and ultimately reduce sea ice extent. This ice melt is freshwater, so it contributes to changing the salinity layers of the ocean, which as we have learned in previous topics, affects temperatures, ocean currents and other climate related processes.
Increasing our understanding of snow on sea ice is important, not only due to its role in climate feedback loops, but also because snow layers add to the uncertainty of sea ice thickness estimates by satellite altimeters.
Featured Educators:
- Dr Rosemary Willatt
- Alex Mavrovic
- Robbie Mallett
- Dr Michel Tsamados
(This video was partly filmed remotely during COVID-19 lockdown conditions)
Albedo
Course topics
The core videos of this course are labelled as topic videos.
We have also provided a range of optional further reading, links, and additional resources to help consolidate your learning. Here is a summary of what is available:
Topic links and resources
In each topic, once you have watched the video and read the accompanying text, you will find the following information:
- Optional Further Reading: These are external links to further reading.
- Featured Images and Animations: Below the text on each video page, you’ll find the featured images and featured animations.
- Interactives: On the 'Interactives' tab on relevent topic pages, you will find a satellite tracking application showing the current location of the satellites, a data viewer from the ESA WEkEO platform, as well as a data viewer, specially created for this course, allowing you to explore a selection of data relevant to the themes and topics in this course. (Please note that due to maintenance, the data viewer is currently unavailable).
Quizzes and comments
- Quizzes: At the end of each week there will be a quizz consisting of around five questions. These will help you consolidate your understanding of new topics, but are not scored. The feedback given with each answer also will also provide you with important information.
Weekly interactive exercises
At the end of each week, we have included a guided exercise, using interactive apps available on other websites, to help you become more familiar with looking at and working with EO datasets. You will be guided through the process of searching for, comparing and drawing conclusions from data relevant to some of the topics covered in that week.
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