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For those interested in new scientific research related to climate change ~
Feb. 13, 2013 — "The September 2012 record low in Arctic sea-ice extent was big news, but a missing piece of the puzzle was lurking below the ocean's surface. What volume of ice floats on Arctic waters? And how does that compare to previous summers? These are difficult but important questions, because how much ice actually remains suggests how vulnerable the ice pack will be to more warming.
New satellite observations confirm a University of Washington analysis that for the past three years has produced widely quoted estimates of Arctic sea-ice volume. Findings based on observations from a European Space Agency satellite, published online in Geophysical Research Letters, show that the Arctic has lost more than a third of summer sea-ice volume since a decade ago, when a U.S. satellite collected similar data.
Combining the UW model and the new satellite observations suggests the summer minimum in Arctic sea ice is one-fifth of what it was in 1980, when the model begins.
"Other people had argued that 75 to 80 percent ice volume loss was too aggressive," said co-author Axel Schweiger, a polar scientist in the UW Applied Physics Laboratory. " What this new paper shows is that our ice loss estimates may have been too conservative, and that the recent decline is possibly more rapid."
Arctic Ocean is on thin ice: European satellite confirms numbers
Feb. 13, 2013 — "The September 2012 record low in Arctic sea-ice extent was big news, but a missing piece of the puzzle was lurking below the ocean's surface. What volume of ice floats on Arctic waters? And how does that compare to previous summers? These are difficult but important questions, because how much ice actually remains suggests how vulnerable the ice pack will be to more warming.
New satellite observations confirm a University of Washington analysis that for the past three years has produced widely quoted estimates of Arctic sea-ice volume. Findings based on observations from a European Space Agency satellite, published online in Geophysical Research Letters, show that the Arctic has lost more than a third of summer sea-ice volume since a decade ago, when a U.S. satellite collected similar data.
Combining the UW model and the new satellite observations suggests the summer minimum in Arctic sea ice is one-fifth of what it was in 1980, when the model begins.
"Other people had argued that 75 to 80 percent ice volume loss was too aggressive," said co-author Axel Schweiger, a polar scientist in the UW Applied Physics Laboratory. " What this new paper shows is that our ice loss estimates may have been too conservative, and that the recent decline is possibly more rapid."
Arctic Ocean is on thin ice: European satellite confirms numbers