Abstract
Permafrost-affected ecosystems of the Arctic-boreal zone in northwestern North America are undergoing profound transformation due to rapid climate change. NASA's Arctic Boreal Vulnerability Experiment (ABoVE) is investigating characteristics that make these ecosystems vulnerable or resilient to this change. ABoVE employs airborne synthetic aperture radar (SAR) as a powerful tool to characterize tundra, taiga, peatlands, and fens. Here, we present an annotated guide to the L-band and P-band airborne SAR data acquired during the 2017, 2018, 2019, and 2022 ABoVE airborne campaigns. We summarize the g 1/480 SAR flight lines and how they fit into the ABoVE experimental design (Miller et al., 2023; https://doi.org/10.3334/ORNLDAAC/2150). The Supplement provides hyperlinks to extensive maps, tables, and every flight plan as well as individual flight lines. We illustrate the interdisciplinary nature of airborne SAR data with examples of preliminary results from ABoVE studies including boreal forest canopy structure from TomoSAR data over Delta Junction, AK, and the Boreal Ecosystem Research and Monitoring Sites (BERMS) area in northern Saskatchewan and active layer thickness and soil moisture data product validation. This paper is presented as a guide to enable interested readers to fully explore the ABoVE L- and P-band airborne SAR data (https://uavsar.jpl.nasa.gov/cgi-bin/data.pl).
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 2605-2624 |
| Number of pages | 20 |
| Journal | Earth System Science Data |
| Volume | 16 |
| Issue number | 6 |
| DOIs | |
| State | Published - Jun 4 2024 |
Funding
The L- and P-band SAR data acquisitions would not have been possible without the indefatigable support of our NASA pilots and flight crews. We thank John McGrath and the NASA AFRC C-20 (N30502) team as well as Derek Rutovic and the NASA JSC G-III (N995NA) team. We also thank the instrument scientists, operators, and data processing team from the JPL Suborbital Radar Science and Engineering Team (334F), who were essential to the successful execution of these experiments and rapid processing of the resulting data products. The fieldwork supporting the SAR campaigns was made possible by the excellent support from Dan Hodkinson, Sarah Sackett, and the ABoVE Logistics Office. Finally, we thank the data curation team at the Oak Ridge Distributed Active Archive Center for their support and expert advice. This work was supported by the NASA Terrestrial Ecology Program's Arctic Boreal Vulnerability Experiment (ABoVE). Jennifer Baltzer was supported by GNWT CIMP 170 and the Canada Research Chairs program. Laura Bourgeau-Chavez was supported by NASA ABoVE (grant nos. NNX15AT83A and 80NSSC19M0107). Thomas A. Douglas was supported by the Strategic Environmental Research and Development Program (project RC18-1170) and the Environmental Security Technology Demonstration Program (project RC22-7408). Nancy French was supported under grant no. 80NSSC19M0108 from the NASA Terrestrial Ecology Program ABoVE project. Scott J. Goetz received support from NASA (grant no. 80NSSC22K1247). John S. Kimball was supported under the NASA Terrestrial Ecology program (grant no. 80NSSC22K1238). This work was performed in part at the University of Southern California under grants from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, Science Mission Directorate, Arctic Boreal Vulnerability Experiment program. Kevin Schaefer and Leah K. Clayton were supported by NASA (grant nos. NNX17AC59A and NNX16AH36A) and award 1562619 from the National Science Foundation. A portion of this work was performed at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, under contract with National Aeronautics and Space Administration (grant no. 80NM0018D0004). Government funding was received.