SG Highlights week of April 25-29, 2016

Highlights for the week of April 25-29, 2016

 
PUBLICATIONS
  • Christopher Potter has published a new paper in the Journal of Earth Science & Climatic Change titled “Landsat Image Analysis of Tree Mortality in the Southern Sierra Nevada Region of California during the 2013-2015 Drought”.

 

Summary: The United States Forest Service (USFS) observed marked increases in tree mortality in the southern Sierra Nevada foothills and mountains of California using aerial monitoring surveys in April 2015.  In this study, Landsat satellite imagery was analyzed at over 90% of these high tree mortality sites in the southern Sierra to understand how the three consecutive years (2013-2015) of extreme drought conditions compared to changes in forest stand growth rates dating to the mid-1980s across this region.  Results showed that changes in Landsat drought-sensitive indices from the years 2011 to 2015 closely matched patterns of tree mortality across USFS April 2015 aerial survey locations in the southern Sierra Nevada.  The historically low snow year of 2015 could have essentially reset the average forest canopy density for many forests in the region to late 1980s levels, due to drought-related mortality, combined with numerous large stand-replacing wildfires.
 
 
EDUCATION and OUTREACH
  • The Ames Earth Science Division participated in the Earth Day Fair on Apr. 22, 2016 sponsored by the US Army Reserve 63rd Regional Support Command. We had a booth highlighting our research activities focused to engage the public's awareness to be a good steward of our home planet. About 30 to 40 4th and 5th grade students from Monta Loma Elementary School in Mountain View and Discovery Charter School 2 in San Jose visited the Fair and our booth.
SG booth at 2016 Earth Day Fair
  • NASA DEVELOP National Program has approved a Summer 2016 project proposal submitted by Ames entitled “San Francisco Bay Area Health & Air Quality”. This project is a collaboration between the DEVELOP participants, the Bay Area Air Quality Management District (BAAQMD), and the Alpha Jet Atmospheric eXperiment (AJAX) to examine the spatial distribution and temporal variation of methane (CH4) emissions in the San Francisco Bay Area using prior satellite, aircraft, and ground-based measurements, and spatial inventory data.
SIGNIFICANT ANNOUNCEMENTS
 
  • A PSTAR grant has been awarded to the FELDSPAR (Field Exploration and Life Detection Sampling for Planetary and Astrobiology Research) team, including Diana Gentry as Co-I (PI: Amanda Stockton, Georgia Tech), studying biosignatures and biodiversity in Icelandic lava fields.  The successful proposal grew out of three successive summer fieldwork expeditions self-organized by an interdisciplinary group of early career investigators in astrobiology, and will fund a further three summers of fieldwork and analysis for the team.

 

  • Code SGG members are deploying to Korea to participate in the Korea US-Air Quality (KORUS-AQ) field mission. The Sun-Sat Team will utilize the 4STAR instrument on the NASA DC-8 to provide observations that will allow better understanding of the factors that control trace gas and aerosol retrievals from space under highly polluted and highly variable surface conditions. James Podolske will be a member of the Langley DACOM/DLH Team on the NASA DC-8.

 

  • The Alpha Jet Atmospheric eXperiment Team conducted its 8th flight of the year (AJAX Flt 186) on Apr. 26, 2016 to obtain measurements of ozone, greenhouse gases, formaldehyde, and meteorological measurements at three different areas of California: Visalia, Western edge of the San Joaquin Valley, and Bodega Bay.
KEY MEETINGS/EVENTS and ATTENDEES
  • Juan L. Torres-Pérez and Liane Guild participated in a week-long meeting in Puerto Rico related to the HICE-PR project. The meeting, April 11-15, included presentations from all the Co-I’s and research assistants/students participating in the project. The third Soil Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) of this project was reviewed for incorporation of field data into the model. Additionally, there was a brainstorming session to explore ways to tie together all the different aspects of this highly interdisciplinary project.
  • At the conclusion of the HICE-PR meeting, Torres-Pérez remained in Puerto Rico for the two weeks to conduct field work on reef benthic characterization on the north coast of the island, as part of HICE-PR.

 

  • David Bubenheim presented his talk titled, “Discussion of Yellow Starthistle Response to Irradiance, Photoperiod, and CO2, ” at the Monday Afternoon Weeders (MAW) Seminar at UC Davis, Davis, CA on 04/25/2016.
UPCOMING MEETINGS
  • Code SGG members will participate in the 2016 SPARC Gravity Wave Symposium, Penn State University, State College, PA, May 16-20, 2016:
  1. Leonhard Pfister, “Small scale motions observed by aircraft in the Tropical Tropopause Layer – Convective and non-convective environments” (Poster)
  2. Eric Jensen, “The influence of atmospheric waves on cirrus cloud occurrence and microphysical properties” (Invited oral)

 

  • Code SGG members will participate in the ORACLES Science Team Meeting, Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, CA, Jun. 23-25, 2016:

 

  • Eric Jensen will make a presentation at the XVII International Conference on Clouds & Precipitation, Manchester, UK, Jul. 25-29, 2016.

 

  • Robert Chatfield will make a presentation at the Quadrennial Ozone Symposium 2016, Edinburgh, Scotland, Sep. 4-9, 2016:  “Significant tropospheric O3 production from extratropical forest fires: When? When not?”

 

  • Robert Chatfield will make a presentation at the International Global Atmospheric Chemistry (IGAC) 2016 Science Conference, Breckenridge, CO, Sep. 26-30, 2016:  “Significant tropospheric O3 production from extratropical forest fires: When? When not?”