GEOS-5 Nature Run Collection

LEAD: After a weekend launch (Saturday, January 10, 2015), NASA’s new climate science instrument called CATS will be installed on the exterior of the International Space Station on Friday, January 16, 2015. 1. NASA laser instrument, called CATS, will help determine details of how tiny particles in the atmosphere warm and cool the earth.2. On average, airborne particles and clouds reflect about a quarter of the sun’s incoming energy which helps cool the earth.3. But the swirling layers of dust, smoke, sea salt, and sulfates can also absorb energy and hold in the earth’s heat.TAG: CATS will help scientists add up those different effects on the earth’s long-term climate. For More InformationSee [http://www.nasa.gov/cats/](http://www.nasa.gov/cats/) Related pages

Narrated video - Jan. 1, 2006 - Dec. 31, 2006For complete transcript, click here. Visualization - Jan. 1, 2006 - Dec. 31, 2006 North America - Feb. 1 - 28, 2006 Africa - Aug. 1 - 31, 2006 Himalayas - Feb. 1 - 28, 2006 Still image - Jan. 1, 2006 Still image - North America - Feb. 12, 2006 Visualization without annotation - Jan. 1, 2006 - Dec. 31, 2006 An ultra-high-resolution NASA computer model has given scientists a stunning new look at how carbon dioxide in the atmosphere travels around the globe.Plumes of carbon dioxide in the simulation swirl and shift as winds disperse the greenhouse gas away from its sources. The simulation also illustrates differences in carbon dioxide levels in the northern and southern hemispheres and distinct swings in global carbon dioxide concentrations as the growth cycle of plants and trees changes with the seasons.The carbon dioxide visualization was produced by a computer model called GEOS-5, created by scientists at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center’s Global Modeling and Assimilation Office.The visualization is a product of a simulation called a “Nature Run.” The Nature Run ingests real data on atmospheric conditions and the emission of greenhouse gases and both natural and man-made particulates. The model is then left to run on its own and simulate the natural behavior of the Earth’s atmosphere. This Nature Run simulates January 2006 through December 2006.While Goddard scientists worked with a “beta” version of the Nature Run internally for several years, they released this updated, improved version to the scientific community for the first time in the fall of 2014. For More InformationSee [http://www.nasa.gov/content/goddard/a-closer-look-at-carbon-dioxide/#.VGpHfC9by7s](http://www.nasa.gov/content/goddard/a-closer-look-at-carbon-dioxide/#.VGpHfC9by7s) Related pages

Finished Production - CATS Overview"CATS in Space Keep Eyes on Atmosphere"NASA Goddard is preparing to demonstrate for the fist time in space, a 3-wavelength, laser remote sensing instrument. The Cloud-Aerosol Transport System or CATS will measure clouds and aerosols in the Earth's atmosphere. This cost-effective, technology demonstration will be deployed on the International Space Station as early as December 2014. For complete transcript, click here. Excerpt from "Studying Earth from the ISS" Press Conference (9/8/14)CATS Principal Investigator Matt McGill discusses the upcoming mission to the International Space Station.For complete transcript, click here. Animation - CATS: How it WorksInternal to the laser, special optical crystals are used to generate 3 wavelengths of light by adding the energy of two photons, to make a single new photon. The final output beam is made up of all three wavelengths and these photons are transmitted in groups, towards the atmosphere, at the speed of light. As photons encounter clouds or particles, scattering of the laser beam occurs. Very few of the photons scatter directly back to the optical telescope, but the ones that return, are collected and counted by sensitive detectors and electronics. By timing the difference between emission and detection, the precise altitude of the particles can be determined. Animation - CATS Data SwathCATS will determine the height, thickness and the extent of smoke, dust particles, and volcanic ash in our atmosphere. Improving cloud data will allow scientist to create more accurate climate models, which in turn, will improve air quality forecast and health risk alerts. Animation - CATS on the Internation Space Station (ISS) B-roll - CATS in Cleanroom CATS LaunchOn January 10, 2015, Space X CRS-5 launched with supplies and the CATS demonstation instrument for the Internation Space Station. CATS Install B-rollTimelapse of CATS Install on ISS, CATS control room during "power on", and CATS mirror door opening. Still image - CATS Large Still image - ISS Large Still image - CATS on ISS The Cloud-Aerosol Transport System (CATS), a new instrument that will measure the character and worldwide distribution of the tiny particles that make up haze, dust, air pollutants, and smoke, will do more than gather data once it's deployed on the International Space Station in December. Related pages

NASA models and supercomputing have created a colorful new view of aerosol movement. Winds disperse vast quantities of dust (red), sea salt (blue), sulphate (white) and black and organic carbon (green) around the world. A massive cloud of dust (red) blows from the Sahara over the Atlantic Ocean, where it may affect the formation or intensity of hurricanes. Concentrations of sea salt (blue) sucked into Pacific Ocean typhoons and hurricanes appear as bright dots in the center of the storms. Extensive fires across Africa and in southeast Australia spew black and organic carbon (green). Sulphate (white) erupts from the Karthala volcano on Grande Comore Island, off the southeast coast of Africa. Using models called GEOS-5 and GOCART, the simulation took several weeks to process on a NASA Center for Climate Simulation supercomputer. For More InformationSee [NASA.gov](http://gmao.gsfc.nasa.gov/research/aerosol/modeling/nr1_movie/) Related pages

1080p version of the Nature Run hyperwall show. Since hyperwall resolutions are usually much higher than HDTV, hurricane labels and tracks have been enlarged for better viewing on HDTV screens. 2 meter temperature above sea level colorbar. Temperature units in Celsius. The original frames used for the 3x3 hyperwall show. Note: Any of these frames should be useable as print resolution stills. The large animation above is diced-up into smaller tiles that can be played on the hyperwall. Each tile is named according to a standard spreadsheet convention with a1 at the upper left and c3 at the lower right. This image illustrates this naming convention used in the diced-up frame sets below. Upper left screen of the 3x3 Nature Run hyperwall show (A1). Primarily showing the West/Northwest portion of North America. Left of center screen of the 3x3 Nature Run hyperwall show (A2). Primarily showing Southern portion of North America and Northern Mexico. Lower left screen of the 3x3 Nature Run hyperwall show (A3). Primarily showing Southern Mexico and Central America. Upper middle screen for the 3x3 Nature Run hyperwall show (B1). Shows the Northeastern tip of North America. Center screen for the 3x3 Nature Run hyperwall show (B2). Shows most of North America's east coast. Lower center screen for the 3x3 Nature Run show (B3). Shows most of most of Cuba and the Caribbean islands. Upper right screen of the 3x3 Nature Run hyperwall show (C1). Shows Europe at the limb of the Earth. Right of center screen of the 3x3 Nature Run hyperwall show (C2). Shows the nortern part of the West African coast. Lower right screen of the 3x3 Nature Run hyperwall show (C3). Primarily shows the South Atlantic. NASA's Goddard's Phil Webster shows how supercomputing Earth's climate is done at the NASA booth at the American Geophysical Union (AGU) meeting in San Francisco. (Photo taken 12/6/11.) This visualization shows a Goddard Earth Observing System Model, Version 5 (GEOS-5) run of the 2005 Hurricane Season driven by Sea Surface Temperatures (SST). The simulation was seeded at the beginning of the run and then ran on its own to create the 6 months of output visualized here. What's interesting is that even though the model did not perfectly duplicate all 27 storms from that very active 2005 hurricane season, it does show 23 storms during that same period. Considering this was an anomalous year, the model did a good job of simulating the large number of storms for that season. An innovative aspect of this global model is the ability to represent realistic hurricane intensities, including 6 hurricanes in the Atlantic for 2005 reaching major strength (category 3 or higher on the Saffir-Simpson scale). This finding could help shape future climate models in predicting hurricane season intensities.Ocean colors ranging from blue to orange depict air temperatures 2 meters (T2M) above sea level. Since SSTs are typically measured at sea level and below, the T2M model output behaves somewhat differently. Nonetheless, it is a reasonable proxy to SST. Landcover information is taken from the Next Generation Blue Marble dataset. Sea Ice is depicted as solid white and clouds are shades of white. Related pages