ESSIC/CISESS/SCSB visiting research scientist Tom Smith has a new article in press at Geophysical Research Letters that analyzes events of extremely warm waters in the oceans known as marine heatwaves (MHWs).
As a part of American Geophysical Union’s 2021 Annual Meeting, AGU is hosting a contest in which scientists submitted photos and videos depicting their science without actually saying what science they study.
ESSIC/CISESS Senior Faculty Specialist Yan Bai is a part of a NOAA Center for Satellite Applications and Research (STAR) project alongside Changyong Cao, STAR/SMCD/SCDA. The scientists found that VIIRS imaging bands can detect shipping containers at ports under clear sky conditions, despite its moderate resolution and the weak signal. This may enable them to monitor the port activities such as shipping container backlog in light of supply-chain challenges as widely discussed in the media. Figure 1 shows that more than 50 ships were found in the port of Los Angeles on October 1, 2021, compared to about a dozen two years ago, which indicates a potential backlog on that day.
The ESSIC/CISESS snowfall rate (SFR) team, Huan Meng, Jun Dong, and Yongzhen Fan, set up a webpage for the NWS Sterling, VA Weather Forecast Office (Office Call Sign: LWX) at the request of Luis Rosa, a senior forecaster from the office. The page is set for the LWX county warning area (CWA). Currently, the page has the operational SFR images from five satellites but will be expanded to include the experimental SFR from four other satellites. The SFR product is produced at CISESS from direct broadcast data retrieved from the University of Wisconsin. The product latency ranges from 12-25 min depending on the satellite.
On December 1 -3, two members of code 613 participated in an international workshop hosted by the European agency Eumesat and the SOLAS project: “Remote Sensing for Ocean-Atmosphere Interactions Studies and Applications Workshop”. The meeting had an assortment of presentations and discussion panels as well as demonstration of the web and cloud interfaces available for data discovery. Santiago Gassó (ESSIC) participated as one the science organizing committee members, as a panelist and convener.
ESSIC/CISESS Scientist Hu “Tiger” Yang has a new article on the Advanced Technology Microwave Sounder (ATMS) in press at IEEE Transactions on Geoscience and Remote Sensing. The Advanced Technology Microwave Sounder (ATMS) is a passive microwave radiometer for the current generation of polar-orbiting meteorological satellites operated by NOAA. The first two ATMS instruments are onboard the Suomi National Polar-orbiting Partnership (S-NPP) and NOAA-20 satellites. The article explains several critical changes in the ATMS operational calibration algorithm since March 2017. Details of the radiance-based ATMS on-orbit calibration are documented and results of pre-launch calibration error budget analysis and post-launch calibration accuracy evaluation are also presented.
ESSIC/CISESS Scientists Likun Wang, Ross Hoffman and Kayo Ide have a new manuscript accepted for publication at the Journal of Atmospheric and Oceanic Technology titled “Orbit Simulator for Satellite and Near Space Platforms Supporting Observing System Simulation Experiments”.
A new paper published in Atmospheric Science Review by ESSIC/AOSC scientist Zhen Zhang highlights the role of anthropogenic activities in driving the growth of atmospheric methane concentrations since 2007.
ESSIC Associate Research Scientist Santiago Gassó was a keynote speaker at the international Blowing South: Southern Hemisphere Dust Symposium held November 8-10, 2021 and organized virtually from Chile. The talk was given during the Present-day: Dynamics session and it was entitled “Southern South America dust activity in relation to long range transport to Antarctica and the Southern Ocean”. No recording was taken of the talk, but slides are available upon request.
Web of Science has honored Dr. Zhanqing Li, Professor at ESSIC and University of Maryland’s Department of Atmospheric and Oceanic Science, as a Highly Cited Researcher, an honor bestowed to fewer than 6,200, or about 0.1%, of the world’s researchers, in 21 research fields and across multiple fields.
