CAREER: Integrating field geomorphology, remote sensing, undergraduate education, and modelling to improve understanding of Arctic hydrology

北极正在经历快速的变化，因为这个敏感的地区对全球范围内能源和水运输的变化做出了反应，深刻影响了当地社区，生态系统和水循环。记录和理解这些变化的最好方法之一是通过研究北极河流。河流是整个北极变化的一个很好的指标，因为河流中的水在任何给定的时间（其“排放”）是水和能量循环的所有其他组成部分的反映：降水，蒸发和地下水运动。然而，后勤方面的困难和国际优先事项的变化导致仪表监测网络急剧减少。同样，北极河流独特的地貌（河流形成的方式以及由景观形成的方式）相对而言研究不足。如果没有开源数据的进步和对北极河流的了解，我们就无法评估最近影响居民和生态系统的北极变化，我们准确预测北极未来气候和水资源的能力也会大大受损。因此，本项目寻求对河流上游泛北极水文循环进行前所未有的核算。该项目将首先开发评估北极水文近期变化所需的基本开源河流数据，然后利用这些数据对北极水域的状况进行编目和了解。具体来说，该项目将结合最近大数据遥感和特定遥感流量估计技术与经典河流地貌学的爆炸，使用NASA的Landsat卫星系列估计从1984年到现在每一条宽于150米的北极河流的流量。这种遥感北极河流评估将建立在详细的实地考察的基础上，由马萨诸塞大学阿默斯特分校的本科生在一个新的项目中设计和执行：北极地球科学与工程集成（IGEA）。IGEA的参与者将设计和领导旨在加深对北极独特地貌的了解的实地工作，并将吸收这些信息，以改进通过遥感进行的排放估计。IGEA学生将在春季学期设计野外实验作为大三学生，在大三后的夏季进行北极实地考察，然后分析他们的数据并在大四秋季培训下一批参与者。本科生有目的地从两个不同的学科，工程和地球科学，以解决学科孤立在本科水平，并通过这个沉浸式的北极研究计划培训，教学和激励下一代跨学科思想家。最后，将利用国际地球物理学和环境研究所提供的遥感排放数据来校准一个开放源全球水文模型，并将该项目的其他组成部分结合起来，以便通过改进对北极河流的基于过程的了解，更充分地了解整个北极系统。

The Arctic is undergoing rapid changes as this sensitive region responds to altered energy and water transport at the global scale, deeply affecting its local communities, ecosystems, and water cycle. One of the best ways to catalog and understand these changes is through the study of Arctic rivers. Rivers are an excellent indicator of overall Arctic change as the water in the river at any given time (its "discharge") is a reflection of all of the other components of the water and energy cycles: precipitation, evaporation, and groundwater movements. However, logistical difficulties and shifting international priorities have resulted in a steep decline in gauge monitoring network. Likewise, the unique geomorphology (the way rivers shape and are shaped by the landscape) of Arctic rivers is relatively understudied. Without advances in open source data and understanding of Arctic rivers we lack the ability to assess recent Artic changes that are affecting citizens and ecosystems alike, and our ability to accurately predict the future climate and water resources of the Arctic is greatly impaired.Therefore, this project seeks an unprecedented accounting of the pan-Arctic hydrologic cycle built from the river up. The project will first develop the basic open-source river data needed to assess recent changes in Arctic hydrology and then use these data to catalog and understand the state of the Arctic's water. Specifically, the project will couple the recent explosion in big-data remote sensing and specific remote sensing discharge estimation techniques with classic fluvial geomorphology to estimate discharge for every Arctic river wider than 150m from 1984 to present using NASA's Landsat family of satellites. This remotely sensed Arctic river assessment will be founded upon a backbone of detailed fieldwork as designed and executed by undergraduates at UMass Amherst in a new program: Integrating Geosciences and Engineering in the Arctic (IGEA). IGEA participants will design and lead fieldwork intended to deepen understanding of unique Arctic geomorphology, and this information will be absorbed to improve the discharge estimates made from remote sensing. IGEA students will design field experiments in the spring semester as juniors, perform Arctic fieldwork in the summer after their junior year, and then analyze their data and train the next cohort of participants in the fall of their senior year. Undergraduates are purposefully drawn from two different disciplines, Engineering and Geosciences, to address disciplinary siloing at the undergraduate level and to train, teach, and inspire the next generation of interdisciplinary thinkers through this immersive Arctic research program. Finally, the IGEA-informed remotely sensed discharge data will be used to calibrate an open source global hydrology model, integrating the other components of this project to reach a fuller understanding of the entire Arctic system achieved through improved process-based understanding of Arctic rivers.