research

Research that I've been involved in on the Greenland Ice Sheet was featured in NASA's Earth Observatory this week. The story provides an overview of recent melting on the ice sheet, the warming that is causing it, and the projected resulting sea-level rise. Photos highlight some of the magnificent and also daunting conditions that we face on the ice sheet.

Read the article here.

My research of the Quelccaya Ice Cap in Peru, the world's largest tropical glacier, took a strange twist in the past few years. While every image I had collected of the ice mass showed considerable retreat since the late 1970s, from 1999 to 2001 there was no discernible retreat when viewed from satellite imagery. Anxious to see what the future would hold, I have feverishly been searching for more recent imagery which contain no clouds and no seasonal snow cover. Getting these data turned out to be much more difficult than I expected, as the fickle climate of the Cordillera requires extreme patience.

...the fickle climate of the Cordillera requires extreme patience. My waiting has finally paid off. I have just procured more recent images of the ice cap from 2004 and 2006. While I am waiting to analyze the images and quantify the retreat since 2001, a quick glance at the 2006 image reveals that the melt that Peruvian glaciers were experiencing until 1999 is back. Stay tuned for more details!

Wow! It's nearly 3am and I just finished my comps. I've posted all of the questions and answers on this site. Feel free to scan through and leave any comments you have.

It is too late tonight to celebrate -- now I must sleep -- but rest assured that I'll be drinking that bottle of wine from the Byrds tomorrow! Thanks! Horray for me!

Much of my research is devoted to evaluating the changes in ice cover we are witnessing on Earth, particularly in the tropics, and the relationship between these changes and global and regional climate.

This data set is presently unpublished, so please contact Todd before using this image.

Take an interactive, 3-d look at the changes on the tropical Quelccaya Ice Cap in southern Peru. Retreat is shown in red, and areas of possible advance are shown in green or blue. The image is draped over a topographic model called a "DEM". You need the flash plug-in. Once the movie loads (be patient, it is 2.4 MB!), click and drag your mouse to rotate.

I have been simultaneously conducting research on both the Quelccaya Ice Cap in the high Peruvian Andes, and the Greenland Ice Sheet. This Quelccaya (pronounced kell-KIE-yah) project has been funded by a number of grants over the years, most recently a through the CIRES Innovative Research Program (co-authored with Anton Seimon). The Greenland project has been funded by grants from NASA and NSF.

This data set is presently unpublished, so please contact Todd before using this image.

The Peru project has yielded exciting new insights into the climatology, glaciology, and impending social and economic problems related to water scarcity. Accordingly, my passion for the Peruvian research has exploded and I plan to make it the primary focus of my dissertation. Already, I have developed new techniques to delineate ice cap boundaries from satellite imagery (Albert, 2002), and created a detailed 40 year history of the ice extent (in preparation). I will be extending this research to examine how the local climate relates to the records of melt from the ice cores and to the record of ice extent derived from satellite and aerial photography.

Take a 3-D look at melt on the Quelccaya Ice Cap, Peru.

Along with the changes in climate and glacier extent, Peru is currently experience a boom in water availability which is driving their agriculturally-based economy, their hydroelectric production, and, hence, their population. This growing population is becoming increasingly dependent on melt-water runoff, a resource that is temporarily abundant, but quickly depleting. Therefore, my project, while quite interesting on its own, becomes critically important when taken in a larger geographical and economic context. Colleagues of mine from around the world are currently conducting other facets of this research in an collaborative attempt to mitigate impeding economic disaster in Peru. The entire project, however, hinges on a greater understanding of the glaciers in the Andes and their complex relationships with the climate.

A group of 12 scientists from around the world gathered this year in Cuzco for an interdisciplinary investigation of the high elevation ecology and environment in the high andean Cordillera Vilconata. The vilconata is home to the largest single mass of ice in the tropics, the Quelccaya ice cap.

Our research was funded in part by the CIRES Innovative Research Program. The principal investigators on the grant were Anton Seimon and myself.

Although we had a spectacular time broke personal elevation records, saw some fantasic vistas, and met wonderful people, the weather did not cooperate and we were unable to complete our research as planned. Much of our science was compromised, but we all managed to keep our spirits up, learn a lot, and a good part of the science was done after all.

Although I mainly took stills and slides, I did take a few digital photos, which I will continute to post online.

[img_assist|fid=10|thumb=0|alt=Jason Box servicing one of the PARCA automatic weather stations on the Greenland Ice Sheet.]
This field season, I flew to Greenland with the Air National Gaurd on April 29th along with Jason Box, Sandy Starkweather and Russ Huff. We stayed in Kangerlussuaq until May 1st when we were put into Swiss Camp by a Twin Otter. Once the camp was open, I calibrated new instruments and collected data from and maintained 5 AWS (automatic weather stations), 4 SMS (smart stakes) and several GPS stations. This work included several snowmobile traverses down into the ablation zone and a helicopter ride up to Crawfor Point. We later were met at Swiss Camp by Koni Steffen, Nicolas Cullen and Jay Zwally. We also installed a 5th SMS in the melt zone.

Two weeks later, Sandy and I headed up to Summit, while Jay and Jason returned to the US, and the others went on to the Petermann Glacier. I returned to the US on June 14th. I encourage you to visit my photo albums to see pictures from Swiss Camp, our traverses and from Summit.

Each Spring my research takes me to the Greenland ice sheet where I install smart stakes and collect data from and maintain GC-Net automatic-weather stations. In 2001, five CU students, our advisor, Koni Steffen, Jay Zwally of NASA and Zubin Emsley of Ball Aerospace were stationed at CU's Swiss Camp and at Summit. Our science goals are in support of the larger PARCA project supported by NASA's Cryospheric Sciences Program.

Changes in ice extent on the tropical Quelccaya Ice Cap, Peru, from 1975 to 1998. This data set is presently unpublished, so please contact Todd before using this image.

Check out this 3-d view. It's a 2.4MB file, so be patient while it loads. You can view from any side.