Acquisition of Portable Field Spectrometer for Research in Cryosphere Processes and Remote Sensing Education

地球表面80%以上的淡水是以雪或冰的形式存在的。季节性积雪约占地球陆地表面的30%，而冰川常年覆盖的积雪占10%。人们对冰冻圈的状况及其对气候变化的反应非常感兴趣。具体地说，熔融动力学时空变异性的评估可以为高山系统对区域气候变异性的响应提供洞察力。现有的地面站网络能够捕捉雪水当量的变化，但不足以准确捕捉一系列空间尺度上的融化过程。在电磁光谱的太阳、反射和热区运行的卫星系统可以解决这些不足之处，并在监测年度和年际尺度的季节性积雪系统的变化方面显示出效用。我们已经初步证明，耦合的光学/热学雪面特征可以指示积雪融化释放的倾向。以前的工作已经证明，雪的光谱反射率是颗粒大小的强烈函数，而颗粒大小可以作为携带液态水的量的函数。这一点再加上指示积雪运动状态的表面热信息，对于阐明与融化有关的内部积雪条件具有很大的潜力。这笔赠款支持购买便携式现场辐射计，该辐射计在电磁光谱的可见光、近红外和短波红外区工作。收集到的数据将有助于开发和验证一种算法，该算法旨在利用来自中等分辨率卫星系统的数据绘制季节性积雪系统的融化生产和排放图，并支持关于冰冻圈对潜在人为强迫的长期反应的研究。此外，作为改进遥感教学的更广泛的大学间倡议的一部分，便携式辐射计系统将在制定健全和全面的遥感课程方面发挥重要作用。

More than 80% of the total fresh water on the Earth's surface is in the form of snow or ice. Seasonal snow cover comprises approximately 30% of the Earth's land surface, while 10% is perennial cover by glaciers. There has been significant interest in the state of the cryosphere and its response to a changing climate. Specifically, the assessment of spatio-temporal variability of melt dynamics can provide insights in the response of alpine systems to regional climate variability. Existing networks of ground-based stations are able to capture changes in snow water equivalent, but are insufficient in accurately capturing the melt process across a range of spatial scales. Satellite systems operating in the solar reflective and thermal regions of the electromagnetic spectrum can address these deficiencies and have demonstrated utility in monitoring changes in seasonal snowpack systems at annual and inter-annual scales. We have initially demonstrated that coupled optical/thermal snow surface characteristics can indicate snowpack propensity for melt release. Previous work has demonstrated that snow spectral reflectance is a strong function of grain-size, which can vary as a function of the amount of entrained liquid water. This coupled with surface thermal information indexing the kinetic state of the snowpack has great potential for elucidating internal snowpack conditions related to melting. This grant supports acquisition of a portable field radiometer, operating in the visible, near-infrared, and short-wave infrared regions of the electromagnetic spectrum. Data collected will facilitate development and validation of an algorithm designed to leverage data from moderate resolution satellite system to map melt production and discharge in seasonal snowpack systems and support research on the long-term response of the cryosphere to potential anthropogenic forcing. Additionally, the portable radiometer system will be important in development of robust and comprehensive remote sensing curriculum as part of a broader inter-university initiative to improve remote sensing instruction.