Collaborative Research on Snow Cover and Near-Surface Climate Interations

9320786名罗宾逊自然地理学家、气候学家和其他科学家最近开始了解积雪在全球气候系统中扮演的关键和高度可变的角色。最近的研究从卫星图像和地面站记录中收集了上个世纪的数据。这项研究还对积雪范围和地表气温之间的关系进行了高级分析。这一合作研究项目将继续这一探索方向，将雪运动学研究扩大到包括雪深的数据，并扩展分析以考虑雪复盖和雪深与其他近地表大气条件之间的联系。将继续从卫星和地面来源获取数据，以便更好地探索整个北半球陆地积雪覆盖范围和深度的空间和时间模式。这些分析还将确定和诊断近地表大气变量对一系列空间和时间尺度上的积雪覆盖变化的敏感性。研究人员还将测试不同的大气环流气候模型模拟观测到的积雪模式及其与其他变量的关系的能力。这项研究将在一个重要的主题上延伸一条富有成效的研究路线。数据收集活动将扩大北半球上个世纪积雪覆盖的数据库，进一步改进已经被其他研究人员使用的资源。对积雪复盖和一系列大气变量之间关系的分析补充了这些活动。对这些关系的更全面的理解应该有助于提高一般知识，并有助于改进气象预报技术。对一般环流模式的评价还应有助于评估大气中二氧化碳的持续增加和其他形式的全球环境变化可能产生的后果。***

9320786 ROBINSON Physical geographers, climatologists, and other scientists recently have come to understand the critical and highly variable role that snow cover plays in the global climate system. Recent research has gathered data over the last century from satellite images and ground station records. This research also has advanced analyses of relationships between the extent of snow cover and surface air temperatures. This collaborative research project will continue this line of inquiry by expanding the study of snow kinematics to include data on snow depths and by extending analyses to consider associations among snow cover and depth and other near-surface atmospheric conditions. Data will continue to be acquired from satellite and surface-based sources in order to better explore spatial and temporal patterns of the extent and depth of terrestrial snow cover throughout the Northern Hemisphere. The analyses also will identify and diagnose sensitivities of near-surface atmospheric variables to variations in snow cover across a range of spatial and temporal scales. The investigators also will test the capabilities of different general-circulation climate models to simulate observed patterns of snow cover and its relationships with other variables. This research will extend a productive line of inquiry on an important topic. The data-collection activities will expand a database of Northern Hemisphere snow cover over the last century, further improving a resource that already has been used by other researchers. These activities are complemented by analyses of relationships between snow cover and a range of atmospheric variables. More complete understandings of these relationships should advance general knowledge and help refine meteorological forecasting techniques. The evaluation of general-circulation models should also prove useful in assessing the possible consequences of continued increases in atmospheric carbon dioxide and other forms of global environmental change. ***