@article{KokhanovskyLamareDanneetal.2019, author = {Kokhanovsky, Alexander and Lamare, Maxim and Danne, Olaf and Brockmann, Carsten and Dumont, Marie and Picard, Ghislain and Arnaud, Laurent and Favier, Vincent and Jourdain, Bruno and Le Meur, Emmanuel and Di Mauro, Biagio and Aoki, Teruo and Niwano, Masashi and Rozanov, Vladimir and Korkin, Sergey and Kipfstuhl, Sepp and Freitag, Johannes and Hoerhold, Maria and Zuhr, Alexandra and Vladimirova, Diana and Faber, Anne-Katrine and Steen-Larsen, Hans Christian and Wahl, Sonja and Andersen, Jonas K. and Vandecrux, Baptiste and van As, Dirk and Mankoff, Kenneth D. and Kern, Michael and Zege, Eleonora and Box, Jason E.}, title = {Retrieval of Snow Properties from the Sentinel-3 Ocean and Land Colour Instrument}, series = {Remote sensing}, volume = {11}, journal = {Remote sensing}, number = {19}, publisher = {MDPI}, address = {Basel}, issn = {2072-4292}, doi = {10.3390/rs11192280}, pages = {43}, year = {2019}, abstract = {The Sentinel Application Platform (SNAP) architecture facilitates Earth Observation data processing. In this work, we present results from a new Snow Processor for SNAP. We also describe physical principles behind the developed snow property retrieval technique based on the analysis of Ocean and Land Colour Instrument (OLCI) onboard Sentinel-3A/B measurements over clean and polluted snow fields. Using OLCI spectral reflectance measurements in the range 400-1020 nm, we derived important snow properties such as spectral and broadband albedo, snow specific surface area, snow extent and grain size on a spatial grid of 300 m. The algorithm also incorporated cloud screening and atmospheric correction procedures over snow surfaces. We present validation results using ground measurements from Antarctica, the Greenland ice sheet and the French Alps. We find the spectral albedo retrieved with accuracy of better than 3\% on average, making our retrievals sufficient for a variety of applications. Broadband albedo is retrieved with the average accuracy of about 5\% over snow. Therefore, the uncertainties of satellite retrievals are close to experimental errors of ground measurements. The retrieved surface grain size shows good agreement with ground observations. Snow specific surface area observations are also consistent with our OLCI retrievals. We present snow albedo and grain size mapping over the inland ice sheet of Greenland for areas including dry snow, melted/melting snow and impurity rich bare ice. The algorithm can be applied to OLCI Sentinel-3 measurements providing an opportunity for creation of long-term snow property records essential for climate monitoring and data assimilation studies-especially in the Arctic region, where we face rapid environmental changes including reduction of snow/ice extent and, therefore, planetary albedo.}, language = {en} } @article{LaeppleHoerholdMuenchetal.2016, author = {Laepple, Thomas and H{\"o}rhold, Maria and M{\"u}nch, Thomas and Freitag, Johannes and Wegner, Anna and Kipfstuhl, Sepp}, title = {Layering of surface snow and firn at Kohnen Station, Antarctica: Noise or seasonal signal?}, series = {Journal of geophysical research : Earth surface}, volume = {121}, journal = {Journal of geophysical research : Earth surface}, publisher = {American Geophysical Union}, address = {Washington}, issn = {2169-9003}, doi = {10.1002/2016JF003919}, pages = {1849 -- 1860}, year = {2016}, abstract = {The density of firn is an important property for monitoring and modeling the ice sheets as well as to model the pore close-off and thus to interpret ice core-based greenhouse gas records. One feature, which is still in debate, is the potential existence of an annual cycle of firn density in low-accumulation regions. Several studies describe or assume seasonally successive density layers, horizontally evenly distributed, as seen in radar data. On the other hand, high-resolution density measurements on firn cores in Antarctica and Greenland show no clear seasonal cycle in the top few meters. A major caveat of most existing snow-pit and firn-core-based studies is that they represent one vertical profile from a laterally heterogeneous density field. To overcome this, we created an extensive data set of horizontal and vertical density data at Kohnen Station, Dronning Maud Land, on the East Antarctic Plateau. We drilled and analyzed three 90m long firn cores as well as 143 one-meter-long vertical profiles from two elongated snow trenches to obtain a two-dimensional view of the density variations. The analysis of the 45m wide and 1m deep density fields reveals a seasonal cycle in density. However, the seasonality is overprinted by strong stratigraphic noise, making it invisible when analyzing single firn cores. Our density data set extends the view from the local ice core perspective to a hundred meter scale and thus supports linking spatially integrating methods such as radar and seismic studies to ice and firn cores.}, language = {en} } @article{MuenchKipfstuhlFreitagetal.2017, author = {Muench, Thomas and Kipfstuhl, Sepp and Freitag, Johannes and Meyer, Hanno and Laepple, Thomas}, title = {Constraints on post-depositional isotope modifications in East Antarctic firn from analysing temporal changes of isotope profiles}, series = {The Cryosphere : TC ; an interactive open access journal of the European Geosciences Union}, volume = {11}, journal = {The Cryosphere : TC ; an interactive open access journal of the European Geosciences Union}, publisher = {Copernicus}, address = {G{\"o}ttingen}, issn = {1994-0416}, doi = {10.5194/tc-11-2175-2017}, pages = {2175 -- 2188}, year = {2017}, abstract = {The isotopic composition of water in ice sheets is extensively used to infer past climate changes. In low-accumulation regions their interpretation is, however, challenged by poorly constrained effects that may influence the initial isotope signal during and after deposition of the snow. This is reflected in snow-pit isotope data from Kohnen Station, Antarctica, which exhibit a seasonal cycle but also strong interannual variations that contradict local temperature observations. These inconsistencies persist even after averaging many profiles and are thus not explained by local stratigraphic noise. Previous studies have suggested that post-depositional processes may significantly influence the isotopic composition of East Antarctic firn. Here, we investigate the importance of post-depositional processes within the open-porous firn (greater than or similar to 10 cm depth) at Kohnen Station by separating spatial from temporal variability. To this end, we analyse 22 isotope profiles obtained from two snow trenches and examine the temporal isotope modifications by comparing the new data with published trench data extracted 2 years earlier. The initial isotope profiles undergo changes over time due to downward advection, firn diffusion and densification in magnitudes consistent with independent estimates. Beyond that, we find further modifications of the original isotope record to be unlikely or small in magnitude (<< 1 parts per thousand RMSD). These results show that the discrepancy between local temperatures and isotopes most likely originates from spatially coherent processes prior to or during deposition, such as precipitation intermittency or systematic isotope modifications acting on drifting or loose surface snow.}, language = {en} } @article{MuenchKipfstuhlFreitagetal.2016, author = {M{\"u}nch, Thomas and Kipfstuhl, Sepp and Freitag, Johannes and Meyer, Hanno and Laepple, Thomas}, title = {Regional climate signal vs. local noise: a two-dimensional view of water isotopes in Antarctic firn at Kohnen Station, Dronning Maud Land}, series = {Climate of the past : an interactive open access journal of the European Geosciences Union}, volume = {12}, journal = {Climate of the past : an interactive open access journal of the European Geosciences Union}, publisher = {Copernicus}, address = {G{\"o}ttingen}, issn = {1814-9324}, doi = {10.5194/cp-12-1565-2016}, pages = {1565 -- 1581}, year = {2016}, abstract = {In low-accumulation regions, the reliability of delta O-18-derived temperature signals from ice cores within the Holocene is unclear, primarily due to the small climate changes relative to the intrinsic noise of the isotopic signal. In order to learn about the representativity of single ice cores and to optimise future ice-core-based climate reconstructions, we studied the stable-water isotope composition of firn at Kohnen Station, Dronning Maud Land, Antarctica. Analysing delta O-18 in two 50m long snow trenches allowed us to create an unprecedented, two-dimensional image characterising the isotopic variations from the centimetre to the 100-metre scale. Our results show seasonal layering of the isotopic composition but also high horizontal isotopic variability caused by local stratigraphic noise. Based on the horizontal and vertical structure of the isotopic variations, we derive a statistical noise model which successfully explains the trench data. The model further allows one to determine an upper bound for the reliability of climate reconstructions conducted in our study region at seasonal to annual resolution, depending on the number and the spacing of the cores taken.}, language = {en} }