GLIMS Update: (1) 'Soot' panel; (2) Ad hoc discussion/dinner Thursday. (3) ASTER acquisition planning

[Jeffrey Kargel]

Dear GLIMS colleagues,
(1) Black carbon/aerosol influences on Himalayan glaciers
A Fall AGU-hosted NASA News Science press conference about aerosol and black carbon influences on Himalayan/Tibetan climate and glaciers (work by Bill Lau and others) will occur tomorrow, noon PDT, at the Press Briefing Room, Moscone West, Room 3012.  The session will be streamed live from AGU's Web site.  The viewing link is: http://www.agu.org/meetings/fm09/newsmedia/pressconference/index.html  I am not associated with the research being highlighted, but I will be a guest panelist to provide a glacier background.  A detailed background presentation (with input from 16 mainly GLIMS colleagues) on the glacier aspects is accessible from a  temporary http site, and will soon be available for the longer term on the GLIMS website.  Most people are not having trouble accessing it, but a couple people have reported problems, so for those people, maybe waiting a day for the GLIMS site access may work.  For http access now, you may find it here in three formats:http://web.hwr.arizona.edu/~gleonard/HighAsiaGlacierChange_SootAerosolsPressConf_AGU2009.pdf

http://web.hwr.arizona.edu/~gleonard/HighAsiaGlacierChange_SootAerosolsPressConf_AGU2009.ppt

http://web.hwr.arizona.edu/~gleonard/HighAsiaGlacierChange_SootAerosolsPressConf_AGU2009.pptx
A NASA press release will be or has been issued, but you may access panel information here:-- NASA issued this media advisory yesterday listing all NASA-related media briefings to be held at AGUhttp://www.nasa.gov/home/hqnews/2009/dec/HQ_M09-232_AGU_advisory.html-- NASA created this dedicated Web page to promote media briefings to be held at AGUhttp://www.nasa.gov/topics/earth/agu/nasa-agu-briefings.html

(2) GLIMS dinner with ad hoc discussion on media relations in GLIMS, science of Himalayan glaciers, and any other matters arising to be held this coming Thursday evening, 6:30-9:30 PM, at a San Francisco restaurant TBD.  Stay tuned; details by Tuesday.  I hope those of you at Fall AGU can take part in the dinner and discussions.  If you have not already done so, please inform Jeff Kargel via email if you will attend.   
(3)  ASTER Science Team meeting update
Bill Sneed and I met last week with the ASTER committee for Science Team Acquisition Requests.The most recent STARs were implemented Jan. 26, 2009.  The result has been a slight uptick in the number of acquisitions over some alpine glacier regions and over far northern Greenland, as was requested last year.  Northern Greenland was very well covered,   but coverage of alpjne regions and especially Greenland south of 75N was still poor.  In October, 2009, a separate category of ASTER acquisitions, the Global Map 4, was initiated, with a welcome revision of gain settings to LLN for bands 1, 2, 3, mimicking GLIMS gains for many regions over snowy and icy areas.  This effectively will turn many Global Map images into GLIMS images, and follows from my suggestion last year.  The direct intent is to get less saturation, and hence better imagery and DEMs over snowy areas, but there should be many benefits for GLIMS.  A drawback is that some of the darkest debris-covered zones will have less DN contrast.  Many Southern Hemisphere people should already be seeing results of this.   
There is recognition by the U.S. ASTER Science Team leader, Mike Abrams, and the broader ASTER STAR Committee, that GLIMS has not been getting its fair quota of imagery.   There is a move to double the number of GLIMS acquisitions starting in January.  For 2009, the daily rate of GLIMS scene acquisitions, listed by month, is: 8, 75, 0, 0, 2, 60, 59, 19, 11, 12 (January through October, in sequence).  Whereas the seasonality of  acquisitions reflects what is intended (concentrating on the austral and boreal summers), the number of acquisitions is inadequate, and this is recognized by the ASTER Team.  A new STAR plan will be input by the end of this month for implementation next month.  A review of acquisitions will take place every 3 months, meaning March, June, September, and December.  I welcome your inputs on successes and failures.
SWIR continues to be inoperative, whereas VNIR and TIR are functioning.  The tight recent-year constraints on pointing have been eased considerably to reflect the fact that the system is still showing no degradation in its pointing, and the fact that overall the system is aging, and we may as well utilize its capabilities while it lasts.  A Global DEM 2 is being discussed and may be ordered.
I presented a comparison of Himalayan and Alaskan glaciation, and I drew heavily from the Himalayan presentation many of us recently worked on, as well as the GLIMS/IPY Alaska consortium's work, so there were over 20 coauthors.  Matt Pritchard gave a stunning presentation on glacier velocity and thickness change assessment of Alaskan (Juneau Icefield) and Patagonian glaciers.  Bill Sneed presented on Greenland glaciers, especially flow fields and terminus and elevation changes.  GLIMS was again well represented at the team meeting.  GLIMS is widely recognized as a premier project within ASTER, and we have you to thank for that.  The presentations, as always, will be posted by JPL within a couple weeks. 


  
 		 	   		  
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