Deep insights into the Arctic of tomorrow

Date:
February 7, 2022
Source:
Alfred Wegener Institute, Helmholtz Centre for Polar and Marine
Research
Summary:
Hundreds of international researchers are currently analyzing
observations from the one-year MOSAiC expedition, during
which hundreds of environmental parameters were recorded with
unprecedented accuracy and frequency over a full annual cycle in
the Central Arctic Ocean.



FULL STORY ========================================================================== Hundreds of international researchers are currently analyzing
observations from the one-year MOSAiC expedition, during which
hundreds of environmental parameters were recorded with unprecedented
accuracy and frequency over a full annual cycle in the Central Arctic
Ocean. They have now published three overview articles on the MOSAiC atmosphere, snow and sea ice, and ocean programs in the journal Elementa, highlighting the importance of examining all components of the climate
system together. These results present the first complete picture of
the climate processes in the central Arctic which is warming more than
two times as fast as the rest of the planet -- processes which affect
weather and climate worldwide.


========================================================================== Diminishing sea ice is a symbol of ongoing global warming: in the Arctic,
its extent has almost halved in summer since satellite records began in
the 1980s.

Less well studied but equally relevant are the thickness and other
properties of the ice. The question of what this means for the future
Arctic and how these changes will affect the global climate were the
impetus for the historic MOSAiC expedition with the German research
icebreaker Polarstern from September 2019 to October 2020. With these
results coming out now the researchers are building the most complete observation-based picture of climate processes in the Arctic, where the
surface air temperature has been rising more than two times as fast as on
the rest of the planet since the 1970s. To study the relevant processes
for a full year required a special concept, in part because the Central
Arctic Ocean is still ice-covered in winter and therefore difficult
to access. During the expedition, the icebreaker froze to a large ice
floe and drifted with the natural transpolar drift across the Arctic
Ocean. And this is where the first surprises came. "We found more dynamic
and faster drifting pack ice than expected. This not only challenged
the teams on the ground in their daily work, but above all resulted in
changed sea-ice properties and sea-ice thickness distributions," reports
Dr Marcel Nicolaus, sea-ice physicist at the Alfred Wegener Institute, Helmholtz Centre for Polar and Marine Research (AWI) and co- leader of
Team Ice in the MOSAiC project.

One of the reasons for the rapid drift is provided by the analysis of the atmospheric research team: "Near the surface there were particularly low temperatures and associated persistent strong winds in the winter months
that pushed Polarstern faster than expected. Large-scale atmospheric
pressure and wind patterns in January to March led to a particularly
strong polar vortex around the Arctic, in addition to a record ozone
hole in the Arctic stratosphere," explains Dr Matthew Shupe, atmospheric scientist at CIRES at the University of Colorado and NOAA and co-leader
of Team Atmosphere.

The oceanography team is analysing how atmosphere and sea ice changes are related to the water temperature and salinity. "We observe an increasing connection between the upper ocean and the deeper warm water layers
in the Central Arctic Ocean, year-round," reports Dr Ce'line Heuze',
physical oceanographer at the University of Gothenburg and co-leader
of the MOSAiC Team Ocean. "We were able to fully map ocean eddies over
a complete annual cycle during the expedition. Nearly simultaneous
measurements from Polarstern, our camp set up next to it on the ice and
the distributed network up to 50 kilometres away from the ship provide
the first assessment of small-scale events up to the regional scale,"
adds Dr Benjamin Rabe, co-leader of the MOSAiC Team Ocean and physical oceanographer at the AWI.

Autonomous sensors were mounted on, in and under the ice to provide
coordinated measurements of properties like temperature, winds or currents
in the atmosphere, in the sea ice and down to several hundred metres
in the ocean below. Atmospheric winds push the ice and cause snow to
drift. The researchers investigated in detail how the winds affect the
sea ice, for example, by recording the tension in the ice and measuring
cracks and the height of the rising ice ridges. These properties in turn influence where and how snow is deposited or swept away. Snow stands out
for its extreme physical properties, as it insulates the sea ice against
the atmosphere, reflects most of the sun light and contains of fresh
water. "We were able to show how short-term atmospheric events (storms
in winter, warm spells in spring, meltwater fluxes in summer or rainfall
in autumn) have large effects on the snow and sea-ice properties over
the coming months," Marcel Nicolaus describes the current findings. "We
found larger spatial variations in the snow cover than expected, due to atmospheric processes and the structure of the underlying sea ice. This
extreme variability means that we have to consider the snow in much more
detail for future model simulations and the interpretation of satellite observations.

As we have also been able to make remote sensing measurements on the ice,
these -- combined with the detailed snow and ice observations -- pave the
way for new and improved sea-ice observations from upcoming satellite
missions. In addition, this enables a better uncertainty assessment of
existing satellite time series," the AWI sea-ice physicist continues.

Atmospheric scientist Matthew Shupe adds: "During MOSAiC, we observed
more than 20 Arctic cyclones, or storms, of various scales that passed
over our ice floe.

We have described these events in unprecedented detail, characterising
the vertical wind structure and momentum transfer to the sea ice and
ocean, leading to sea-ice movement and fracture. During these events,
the impacts of warm air masses moving into the Central Arctic with
their associated clouds caused significant shifts in all components of
the surface energy balance, affecting the sea-ice temperature, growth,
and/or melt. Additionally, year-round information on the variability
of atmospheric composition and aerosols provides new insights into the
relative influences of long-range transport versus local processes,
with important implications for climate-relevant cycles (e.g. the carbon cycle), clouds, and the radiative balance." The three overview articles
serve as references for a vast array of future scientific work. "The
physical observations are the basis for interpreting biogeochemical cycles
and ecosystem processes, and for supporting coupled models that we use to
learn even more about climate feedbacks and the global repercussions of
Arctic change. These changes can affect weather and climate worldwide,"
says Prof. Markus Rex, head of MOSAiC and atmospheric scientist at the
AWI. "It is fascinating how accurately we can map individual processes
and relate them to each other. I am pleased to see how several hundred
MOSAiC participants have collaborated on these publications. International cooperation with expedition participants from so many countries continues productively in a highly coordinated manner, even though the expedition
has been over for more than a year. In this way, we will be able to
provide ever more important insights into climate change, which will
provide a knowledge base for societal transformation towards a sustainable approach to planet Earth," says MOSAiC leader Markus Rex.

Background information on MOSAiC During the Multidisciplinary drifting Observatory for the Study of Arctic Climate (MOSAiC) expedition, experts
from 20 nations explored the Arctic for an entire year. From autumn
2019 to autumn 2020, the German research icebreaker Polarstern drifted
frozen in the ice through the Arctic Ocean. MOSAiC was coordinated by the Alfred Wegener Institute, Helmholtz Centre for Polar and Marine Research
(AWI). In order to make this unique project a success and to obtain the
most valuable data possible, more than 80 institutes had pooled their
resources in a research consortium. The total cost of the expedition was
about 150 million euros, mostly funded by the German Federal Ministry
of Education and Research.

========================================================================== Story Source: Materials provided by Alfred_Wegener_Institute,_Helmholtz_Centre_for_Polar_and
Marine_Research. Note: Content may be edited for style and length.


========================================================================== Journal References:
1. Marcel Nicolaus, Donald K. Perovich, Gunnar Spreen, Mats
A. Granskog,
Luisa von Albedyll, Michael Angelopoulos, Philipp Anhaus, Stefanie
Arndt, H. Jakob Belter, Vladimir Bessonov, Gerit Birnbaum, Jo"rg
Brauchle, Radiance Calmer, Estel Cardellach, Bin Cheng, David
Clemens-Sewall, Ruzica Dadic, Ellen Damm, Gijs de Boer, Oguz Demir,
Klaus Dethloff, Dmitry V. Divine, Allison A. Fong, Steven Fons,
Markus M. Frey, Niels Fuchs, Carolina Gabarro', Sebastian Gerland,
Helge F. Goessling, Rolf Gradinger, Jari Haapala, Christian
Haas, Jonathan Hamilton, Henna-Reetta Hannula, Stefan Hendricks,
Andreas Herber, Ce'line Heuze', Mario Hoppmann, Knut Vilhelm
Ho/yland, Marcus Huntemann, Jennifer K. Hutchings, Byongjun Hwang,
Polona Itkin, Hans-Werner Jacobi, Matthias Jaggi, Arttu Jutila,
Lars Kaleschke, Christian Katlein, Nikolai Kolabutin, Daniela
Krampe, Steen Savstrup Kristensen, Thomas Krumpen, Nathan Kurtz,
Astrid Lampert, Benjamin Allen Lange, Ruibo Lei, Bonnie Light,
Felix Linhardt, Glen E. Liston, Brice Loose, Amy R. Macfarlane,
Mallik Mahmud, Ilkka O.

Matero, So"nke Maus, Anne Morgenstern, Reza Naderpour, Vishnu
Nandan, Alexey Niubom, Marc Oggier, Natascha Oppelt, Falk Pa"tzold,
Christophe Perron, Tomasz Petrovsky, Roberta Pirazzini, Chris
Polashenski, Benjamin Rabe, Ian A. Raphael, Julia Regnery, Markus
Rex, Robert Ricker, Kathrin Riemann-Campe, Annette Rinke, Jan Rohde,
Evgenii Salganik, Randall K.

Scharien, Martin Schiller, Martin Schneebeli, Maximilian Semmling,
Egor Shimanchuk, Matthew D. Shupe, Madison M. Smith, Vasily
Smolyanitsky, Vladimir Sokolov, Tim Stanton, Julienne Stroeve,
Linda Thielke, Anna Timofeeva, Rasmus Tage Tonboe, Aikaterini
Tavri, Michel Tsamados, David N. Wagner, Daniel Watkins,
Melinda Webster, Manfred Wendisch. Overview of the MOSAiC
expedition. Elementa: Science of the Anthropocene, 2022; 10 (1)
DOI: 10.1525/elementa.2021.000046
2. Matthew D. Shupe, Markus Rex, Byron Blomquist, P. Ola G. Persson,
Julia
Schmale, Taneil Uttal, Dietrich Althausen, He'le`ne Angot,
Stephen Archer, Ludovic Bariteau, Ivo Beck, John Bilberry, Silvia
Bucci, Clifton Buck, Matt Boyer, Zoe' Brasseur, Ian M. Brooks,
Radiance Calmer, John Cassano, Vagner Castro, David Chu, David
Costa, Christopher J. Cox, Jessie Creamean, Susanne Crewell,
Sandro Dahlke, Ellen Damm, Gijs de Boer, Holger Deckelmann,
Klaus Dethloff, Marina Du"tsch, Kerstin Ebell, Andre' Ehrlich,
Jody Ellis, Ronny Engelmann, Allison A. Fong, Markus M.

Frey, Michael R. Gallagher, Laurens Ganzeveld, Rolf Gradinger,
Ju"rgen Graeser, Vernon Greenamyer, Hannes Griesche, Steele
Griffiths, Jonathan Hamilton, Gu"nther Heinemann, Detlev Helmig,
Andreas Herber, Ce'line Heuze', Julian Hofer, Todd Houchens, Dean
Howard, Jun Inoue, Hans-Werner Jacobi, Ralf Jaiser, Tuija Jokinen,
Olivier Jourdan, Gina Jozef, Wessley King, Amelie Kirchgaessner,
Marcus Klingebiel, Misha Krassovski, Thomas Krumpen, Astrid
Lampert, William Landing, Tiia Laurila, Dale Lawrence, Michael
Lonardi, Brice Loose, Christof Lu"pkes, Maximilian Maahn, Andreas
Macke, Wieslaw Maslowski, Christopher Marsay, Marion Maturilli,
Mario Mech, Sara Morris, Manuel Moser, Marcel Nicolaus, Paul
Ortega, Jackson Osborn, Falk Pa"tzold, Donald K. Perovich, Tuukka
Peta"ja", Christian Pilz, Roberta Pirazzini, Kevin Posman, Heath
Powers, Kerri A. Pratt, Andreas Preusser, Lauriane Que'le'ver,
Martin Radenz, Benjamin Rabe, Annette Rinke, Torsten Sachs,
Alexander Schulz, Holger Siebert, Tercio Silva, Amy Solomon, Anja
Sommerfeld, Gunnar Spreen, Mark Stephens, Andreas Stohl, Gunilla
Svensson, Janek Uin, Juarez Viegas, Christiane Voigt, Peter von
der Gathen, Birgit Wehner, Jeffrey M. Welker, Manfred Wendisch,
Martin Werner, ZhouQing Xie, Fange Yue. Overview of the MOSAiC
expedition--Atmosphere. Elementa: Science of the Anthropocene,
2022; 10 (1) DOI: 10.1525/elementa.2021.00060
3. Benjamin Rabe, Ce'line Heuze', Julia Regnery, Yevgeny Aksenov, Jacob
Allerholt et al. Overview of the MOSAiC expedition: Physical
oceanography. Elementa: Science of the Anthropocene, 2022 DOI:
10.1525/ elementa.2021.00062 ==========================================================================

Link to news story: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2022/02/220207083502.htm

--- up 9 weeks, 2 days, 7 hours, 13 minutes
* Origin: -=> Castle Rock BBS <=- Now Husky HPT Powered! (1:317/3)