A Summer ABoVE the Warming Arctic

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    ID: 12684 Produced Video

    Earth Expedition: Studying Wildfires in a Warming Arctic

    Aug. 15th, 2017
    (updated May 3rd, 2023)

    Music: Suspended Beauty by Laurent Dury [SACEM]Complete transcript available. || In the Arctic, different effects of the warming climate can combine to create big changes to the landscape. Although wildfires are a normal part of life in the forest regions of the far north, they’re becoming more common, burning larger swaths of land more frequently.This is partly due to different weather patterns. Many wildfires are the result of lightning strikes, and as lightning in the area becomes more common, so do fires.Scientists with NASA’s Arctic Boreal Vulnerability Experiment (ABoVE) are investigating how native vegetation responds to this more frequent burning, looking at places where spruce trees have burned and been replaced by deciduous plants like willow and birch.The effects of the changing plant life aren’t clear yet, and researchers are trying to understand how these plants will fare in the warming Arctic. ||

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  • 
    ID: 12685 Produced Video

    Earth Expedition: Taking in Some Arctic Air

    Aug. 15th, 2017
    (updated May 3rd, 2023)

    Last week, NASA's DC-8 plane flew over Alaska and Canada, measuring carbon dioxide and methane in the Arctic air. The plane carried five instruments to make these measurements for the Active Sensing of Carbon dioxide Emissions over Nights, Days and Seasons (ASCENDS) experiment.All part of NASA's Arctic Boreal Vulnerability Experiment (ABoVE), the science team is studying how the Arctic is changing in a warming climate. || Music: Ellipsis by Ben Niblett [PRS], Jon Cotton [PRS]Complete transcript available. ||

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  • 
    ID: 12682 Produced Video

    Earth Expedition: Flying Over a Greening Arctic Tundra

    Aug. 10th, 2017
    (updated May 3rd, 2023)

    NASA researchers are flying over Alaska and Canada, studying the effects of a greening Arctic.Permafrost, the continuously frozen layer of soil under the Arctic region is thawing as the climate warms up. In the tundra regions, shrubs and soil bacteria are in a race to take advantage of these changing conditions.Shrubs grow where thawing permafrost produces water and carbon dioxide, while underground, the same thawing permafrost exposes organic material that’s been frozen for thousands of years, a feast for soil bacteria.Although the new vegetation absorbs some carbon dioxide from the region, the invigorated bacteria produce both carbon dioxide and methane. From NASA’s DC-8 plane, researchers with the Arctic Boreal Vulnerability Experiment (ABoVE) are measuring how much carbon dioxide is being released by the Arctic’s greening tundra, acting as referees in the carbon race between plants and soil bacteria. ||

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  • 
    ID: 12683 Produced Video

    Earth Expedition: Spiraling Above Canada to Measure Carbon

    Aug. 10th, 2017
    (updated May 3rd, 2023)

    High above Alaska and Canada, researchers from NASA’s Arctic Boreal Vulnerability Experiment (ABoVE) are studying carbon emissions from a DC-8 plane. The plane carries new lidar instruments to measure concentrations of carbon dioxide and methane in the air, far below the aircraft. The plane also carries instruments that can measure carbon concentrations with extreme accuracy, but only from up-close.To check the accuracy of the lidar measurements, the team needs to fly the plane down to the lower altitudes the lidar is studying. Taking measurements at every altitude is no easy feat. The plane flies in looping spirals down to just about 100 feet above the ground, and then spirals back up to about 30,000 feet, taking measurements the whole time. ||

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  • 
    ID: 12351 Produced Video

    ABoVE campaign videos

    Aug. 26th, 2016
    (updated May 3rd, 2023)

    The Arctic Boreal and Vulnerability Experiment (ABoVE) covers 2.5 million square miles of tundra, forests, permafrost and lakes in Alaska and Northwestern Canada. ABoVE scientists are using satellites and aircraft to study this formidable terrain as it changes in a warming climate. Remote sensing by itself is not enough to understand the whole picture, so teams of researchers will go out into the field to gather data. With support from NASA’s Terrestrial Ecology Program, ABoVE researchers investigate questions about the role of climate in wildfires, thawing permafrost, wildlife migration habits, insect outbreaks and more. ||

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