23 December, 2008

New A-CAP Data Sets and Basemaps Available

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NSIDC has released the following data sets for access through the AGDC Antarctic Cryosphere Access Portal (A-CAP).

• Blankenship, D. D., D. L. Morse, C. A. Finn, R. E. Bell, M. E. Peters, S. D. Kempf, et al. 2001. Ice thickness and surface elevation, southeastern Ross Embayment, West Antarctica. (NSIDC-0099). To access this data set from the A-CAP Web page, expand the AGDC NSF PI data sets menu. Click on list by > investigator, and select the data set.  Available maps include elevation and ice thickness. (Figure 1)
• Cuffey, K., A. Bliss, J. Kavanaugh, and S. Aciego. 2007. Surface velocities of Taylor Glacier, Antarctica (NSIDC-0324). To access this data set, expand the AGDC NSF PI data sets menu, click on list by > investigator, and select the data set. The data set includes maps of elevation, velocity magnitude, and North, East, and vertical velocity of Taylor Glacier.

Figure 1. Left: Ice thickness map from Blankenship, et al. Right: Surface elevation map from Blankenship, et al.
—Credit: NSIDC

• Monaghan, A. J., D. H. Bromwich, and S.-H. Wang. 2006. Recent trends in Antarctic snow accumulation from Polar MM5 simulations. To access this data set through A-CAP, expand the basemap layer menu, and click on climate variables.The Monaghan data set is listed under accumulation, and can be viewed as a grayscale, graded, or contour map. (Figure 2)
• Van de Berg, W. J., M. R. van den Broeke, C. H. Reijmer, and E. van Meijgaard. 2005. Characteristics of the Antarctic surface mass balance, 1958-2002, using a regional atmospheric climate model. To access this data set through A-CAP, expand the basemap layer menu, and click on climate variables. The Van de Berg data set is listed under Surface Mass Balance (SMB), and can be viewed as a grayscale, graded, or contour map. (Figure 3)

Figure 2. Graded accumulation map from Monaghan et al.
—Credit: NSIDC

Figure 3. Contour map of surface mass balance from Van de Berg et al. —Credit: NSIDC

A-CAP is a geo-visualization and data download tool developed at the National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC) Antarctic Glaciological Data Center (AGDC). A-CAP provides AGDC data and other Antarctic-wide parameters, including glaciology, ice core data, snow accumulation, satellite imagery, Digital Elevation Models (DEM's), sea ice concentration, and many other cryosphere-related scientific measurements. For more information on how to access data using A-CAP, see the A-CAP User Manual.

We welcome your feedback on this project, which is currently in active development. If you have questions, comments or suggestions, please contact the A-CAP Team. A-CAP is developed using MapServer, an open source development environment for building spatially-enabled Internet applications.