Scheduled special issues
The following special issues are scheduled for publication in TC:
A
The Norwegian Computing Center, the Danish Meteorological Institute (DMI), the Technical University of Denmark (DTU), Polar View, the Nansen Environmental and Remote Sensing Center (NERSC), and ESA (European Space Agency) have created an extraordinary sea ice challenge, with the aim to bring together artificial intelligence (AI) and Earth observation players to address the challenge of automated sea ice mapping
from Sentinel-1 synthetic aperture radar (SAR) data.
The objective of the AutoICE challenge is to advance the state of the art of sea ice parameter retrieval from SAR data, resulting in an increased capacity to derive more robust and accurate automated sea ice maps. In this challenge, we aim to push forward the new capability to retrieve multiple parameters, specifically, sea ice concentration, stage of development, and floe size (form). The relevance of these capabilities should also be seen in the context of the upcoming Copernicus next-generation Sentinel-1 SAR mission and the Copernicus Polar Expansion mission CIMR (Copernicus Imaging Microwave Radiometer).
The participants of the challenge are welcome to publish their results and approaches in a special issue dedicated to it. In addition, an overview paper will be published describing the challenge and summarizing the results.
E
Permafrost is a widespread phenomenon in the cold regions of the globe and is clearly under-represented in global monitoring networks. Studies of permafrost dynamics are typically conducted through boreholes, which are invasive, expensive, and rarely representative at the field level. Geophysical techniques such as electrical, electromagnetic, and seismic methods have demonstrated their potential as useful non-invasive tools for detecting, mapping, and characterizing permafrost with a spatial and temporal resolution which cannot be achieved using only borehole data. Moreover geophysical surveys are flexible and can be easily adapted to different field conditions and investigation targets. Today, electrical methods such as electrical resistivity tomography (ERT) have been established as standard techniques to gain a general understanding of the subsurface structure at permafrost sites. In addition, there is a growing interest in the development of emerging technologies such as induced polarization methods and environmental seismology as well as joint inversion approaches of multiple datasets to gain a better interpretation of geophysical signatures at permafrost sites. Given their high sensitivity to changes in the ice and water content of the subsurface, repeated surveys, as well as continuous monitoring of geophysical properties, have become popular for monitoring permafrost degradation in both polar and mountain permafrost environments. A dedicated action group of the International Permafrost Association (IPA) has recently been formed to advance an international database for electrical survey data on permafrost (Towards an International Database of Geoelectrical Surveys on Permafrost, IDGSP).
This special issue aims for an overview of current challenges and recent advances in detecting, characterizing, and monitoring the geophysical properties of frozen ground, including advances in survey design and monitoring set‐up, processing and inversion of collected time series, laboratory experiments, and quantification of temporal changes in ground ice content. We welcome applied and theoretical contributions based on all relevant geophysical techniques from polar and mountain permafrost environments as well as laboratory investigations.
Review process: all papers of this special issue underwent the regular interactive peer-review process of The Cryosphere handled by members of the editorial board as well as guest editors designated by the TC co-editors-in-chief.
I
N
- climate-change-induced cryospheric alterations and impacts on the water cycle in northern environments, e.g. changes in the snowpack, glacier recession, permafrost thaw, stream discharge, lake size, and wildfires;
- interdisciplinary research that furthers our understanding of the nexus between hydrological, biogeochemical, and ecosystem processes in cold-region environments;
- the impacts of current (e.g. mining, logging, dam building) and past (e.g. peatland drainage/restoration) land-use changes in high-latitude regions;
- transdisciplinary research, including knowledge of Indigenous communities and other interested parties, ideally aimed at sustainable co-development of climate change adaptation and mitigation strategies;
- studies providing open tools for the development and testing of transposable models in cold-region environments;
- studies providing information on or presenting new tools for the improvement and standardization of measurement techniques and network design in northern regions.
O
T
Two closely coordinated groups (one from the USA and the other from Europe) are revisiting the Camp Century sub-ice sediment and the silty ice zone just above it using a wide variety of analytical techniques to make inferences about ice sheet behaviour, palaeo-climate, and palaeo-ecology as well as sediment transport and sourcing. The paper that kicked this off was in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) 2 years ago: "A multi-million-year-old record of Greenland vegetation and glacial history preserved in sediment beneath 1.4 km of ice at Camp Century" (Christ et al., 2021).
Talking among the 20+ lead investigators, we decided that the papers coming out of multiple, coordinated investigations of this historic (and still unique) ice core would be very useful to the broader community if they could be gathered into a special issue. Having these papers together would increase their impact and accessibility. Because of the wide variety of investigations being conducted on the core materials, a combined special issue including papers from both The Cryosphere and Climate of the Past will generate the most contributions and the largest readership.
Reference:
Christ, A. J., Bieman, P. R., Schaefer, J. M., Dahl-Jensen, D., Steffensen, J. P, Corbett, L. B., Peteet, D. M., Thomas, E. K., Steig, E. J., Rittenour, T. M., Tison, J.-L., Blard, P.-H., Perdrial, N., Dethier, D. P., Lini, A., Hidy, A. J., Caffee, M. W., and Southon, J.: A multi-million-year-old record of Greenland vegetation and glacial history preserved in sediment beneath 1.4 km of ice at Camp Century, P. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA, 118, e2021442118, https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2021442118, 2021.
2023
Permafrost is a widespread phenomenon in the cold regions of the globe and is clearly under-represented in global monitoring networks. Studies of permafrost dynamics are typically conducted through boreholes, which are invasive, expensive, and rarely representative at the field level. Geophysical techniques such as electrical, electromagnetic, and seismic methods have demonstrated their potential as useful non-invasive tools for detecting, mapping, and characterizing permafrost with a spatial and temporal resolution which cannot be achieved using only borehole data. Moreover geophysical surveys are flexible and can be easily adapted to different field conditions and investigation targets. Today, electrical methods such as electrical resistivity tomography (ERT) have been established as standard techniques to gain a general understanding of the subsurface structure at permafrost sites. In addition, there is a growing interest in the development of emerging technologies such as induced polarization methods and environmental seismology as well as joint inversion approaches of multiple datasets to gain a better interpretation of geophysical signatures at permafrost sites. Given their high sensitivity to changes in the ice and water content of the subsurface, repeated surveys, as well as continuous monitoring of geophysical properties, have become popular for monitoring permafrost degradation in both polar and mountain permafrost environments. A dedicated action group of the International Permafrost Association (IPA) has recently been formed to advance an international database for electrical survey data on permafrost (Towards an International Database of Geoelectrical Surveys on Permafrost, IDGSP).
This special issue aims for an overview of current challenges and recent advances in detecting, characterizing, and monitoring the geophysical properties of frozen ground, including advances in survey design and monitoring set‐up, processing and inversion of collected time series, laboratory experiments, and quantification of temporal changes in ground ice content. We welcome applied and theoretical contributions based on all relevant geophysical techniques from polar and mountain permafrost environments as well as laboratory investigations.
Review process: all papers of this special issue underwent the regular interactive peer-review process of The Cryosphere handled by members of the editorial board as well as guest editors designated by the TC co-editors-in-chief.
- climate-change-induced cryospheric alterations and impacts on the water cycle in northern environments, e.g. changes in the snowpack, glacier recession, permafrost thaw, stream discharge, lake size, and wildfires;
- interdisciplinary research that furthers our understanding of the nexus between hydrological, biogeochemical, and ecosystem processes in cold-region environments;
- the impacts of current (e.g. mining, logging, dam building) and past (e.g. peatland drainage/restoration) land-use changes in high-latitude regions;
- transdisciplinary research, including knowledge of Indigenous communities and other interested parties, ideally aimed at sustainable co-development of climate change adaptation and mitigation strategies;
- studies providing open tools for the development and testing of transposable models in cold-region environments;
- studies providing information on or presenting new tools for the improvement and standardization of measurement techniques and network design in northern regions.
The Norwegian Computing Center, the Danish Meteorological Institute (DMI), the Technical University of Denmark (DTU), Polar View, the Nansen Environmental and Remote Sensing Center (NERSC), and ESA (European Space Agency) have created an extraordinary sea ice challenge, with the aim to bring together artificial intelligence (AI) and Earth observation players to address the challenge of automated sea ice mapping
from Sentinel-1 synthetic aperture radar (SAR) data.
The objective of the AutoICE challenge is to advance the state of the art of sea ice parameter retrieval from SAR data, resulting in an increased capacity to derive more robust and accurate automated sea ice maps. In this challenge, we aim to push forward the new capability to retrieve multiple parameters, specifically, sea ice concentration, stage of development, and floe size (form). The relevance of these capabilities should also be seen in the context of the upcoming Copernicus next-generation Sentinel-1 SAR mission and the Copernicus Polar Expansion mission CIMR (Copernicus Imaging Microwave Radiometer).
The participants of the challenge are welcome to publish their results and approaches in a special issue dedicated to it. In addition, an overview paper will be published describing the challenge and summarizing the results.
Two closely coordinated groups (one from the USA and the other from Europe) are revisiting the Camp Century sub-ice sediment and the silty ice zone just above it using a wide variety of analytical techniques to make inferences about ice sheet behaviour, palaeo-climate, and palaeo-ecology as well as sediment transport and sourcing. The paper that kicked this off was in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) 2 years ago: "A multi-million-year-old record of Greenland vegetation and glacial history preserved in sediment beneath 1.4 km of ice at Camp Century" (Christ et al., 2021).
Talking among the 20+ lead investigators, we decided that the papers coming out of multiple, coordinated investigations of this historic (and still unique) ice core would be very useful to the broader community if they could be gathered into a special issue. Having these papers together would increase their impact and accessibility. Because of the wide variety of investigations being conducted on the core materials, a combined special issue including papers from both The Cryosphere and Climate of the Past will generate the most contributions and the largest readership.
Reference:
Christ, A. J., Bieman, P. R., Schaefer, J. M., Dahl-Jensen, D., Steffensen, J. P, Corbett, L. B., Peteet, D. M., Thomas, E. K., Steig, E. J., Rittenour, T. M., Tison, J.-L., Blard, P.-H., Perdrial, N., Dethier, D. P., Lini, A., Hidy, A. J., Caffee, M. W., and Southon, J.: A multi-million-year-old record of Greenland vegetation and glacial history preserved in sediment beneath 1.4 km of ice at Camp Century, P. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA, 118, e2021442118, https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2021442118, 2021.