The ORNL DAAC recently released the following Arctic-Boreal Vulnerability Experiment (ABoVE) dataset by Pan, C.G., et al. (2021):
ABoVE: Passive Microwave-derived Annual Snowpack Main Melt Onset Date Maps, 1988-2016
This dataset provides the annual date of snowpack seasonal beginning melt (i.e., main melt onset date, MMOD) across northwest Canada; Alaska, U.S.; and parts of far eastern Russia at 6.25 km resolution for the period 1988-2016. MMOD was derived from the daily K-band and Ka-band from the Making Earth Science Data Records for Use in Research Environments (MEaSUREs) Calibrated Enhanced-Resolution Passive Microwave Daily Brightness Temperature. The MMOD dataset was validated using the transition date from Freeze Degree Days (FDD) to Thaw Degree Days (TDD) from in situ air temperature observations from 31 SNOw TELemetry network (SNOTEL) observations. The resulting MMOD data record is suitable for documenting the spatial-temporal impacts of MMOD variability in ecosystem services, wildlife movements, and hydrologic processes across the ABoVE domain.
The ABoVE is a NASA Terrestrial Ecology Program field campaign being conducted in Alaska and western Canada, for 8 to 10 years, starting in 2015. Research for ABoVE links field-based, process-level studies with geospatial data products derived from airborne and satellite sensors, providing a foundation for improving the analysis, and modeling capabilities needed to understand and predict ecosystem responses to, and societal implications of, climate change in the Arctic and Boreal regions.
Additional data from ABoVE and other relevant links can be found on the ORNL DAAC's ABoVE Project Page.
Citation: Pan, C.G., P.B. Kirchner, J.S. Kimball, and J. Du. 2021. ABoVE: Passive Microwave-derived Annual Snowpack Main Melt Onset Date Maps, 1988-2016. ORNL DAAC, Oak Ridge, Tennessee, USA. https://doi.org/10.3334/ORNLDAAC/1841