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U.S. Law of the Sea team visits Norway
A team from the U.S. Interagency Task Force for the Extended Continental Shelf (ECS) visited the United Nations Environmental Programme Global Resource Information Database (UNEP/GRID) in Arendal, Norway on August 4 and 5, 2008 and participated in a special United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) session at the 33rd International Geological Congress (IGC) in Oslo, Norway on August 6-9, 2008. The team consisted of Dr. Christopher Fox, Director of NOAA's National Geophysical Data Center (NGDC), Ms. Susan McLean, Chief of NGDC's Marine Geology and Geophysics Division, and Mr. Brian Van Pay from the Department of State's Office of Ocean Affairs. Discussions at UNEP/GRID Arendal included NGDC's support for their mission to build capacity in developing countries to construct UNCLOS ECS submissions and review of their technologies in support of that effort. NGDC's archive is the primary source of marine data supporting most nations' ECS submission packages, including the recently approved submission by Australia. The two-day conference at the IGC included presentations by numerous countries that are in the process of assembling ECS submission packages.
Significance: In May 2007, President Bush asked the Senate to accede to the UNCLOS as soon as possible. This action will allow the United States to delineate an Extended Continental Shelf under international convention that would increase the Nation's resource base. Following Senate action, the U.S. will have ten years to assemble a submission to the UN. NGDC has been designated as the data integration and analysis center for the U.S. effort.
Outcome: This effort supports the Goal 3 objective to demonstrate global leadership on environmental issues.
( or 303-497-6215)
National Geophysical Data Center (NGDC) Restores Boulder Station Ionospheric Sounding Instrumentation to Operation
In March 2004, the US Air Force donated an excess Digisonde 256 (D256) ionosonde to NGDC for use in the Boulder Station. Built in the 1980's, the D256 features a high power vacuum tube based transmitter. While functional, the D256 transmitter featured high levels of spurious radio frequency emissions, which steadily increased as the transmitter aged and recently began to fail. In July 2008, the failed transmitter was replaced with a solid state amplifier. Following a period of testing, the ionosonde was restored to reliable operation. In addition, the new amplifier greatly reduced unwanted radio emissions from the system.
Significance: This upgrade will allow NGDC to continue to reliably measure the space weather and climate over the US Western Region while reducing the impact on the radio frequency environment. These observations are important to long term climatology, science efforts such as coordinated ground/space observations and experiments, as well as the US civilian space weather program.
Outcome: This effort supports the Goal 3 objective to advance the Global Earth Observation System of Systems (GEOSS).
( or 303-497-4331)
National Geophysical Data Center (NGDC) creates a new image of the "Age of the Oceanic Lithosphere"
NGDC has created a new color map graphically illustrating the age of the ocean floor, including labeled tectonic plates and boundaries. The image is based on the April 2008 Dietmar Muller, et al. 2-minute resolution grid representing the age of the oceanic crust and three companion digital models of age uncertainty, spreading rates, and spreading asymmetries of the world's ocean basins. Both the map and underlying data are available for free download from the NOAA/NGDC website (http://www.ngdc.noaa.gov/mgg/mggd.html), and the image is also offered as a presentation on NOAA's "Science On a Sphere" (SOS).
Significance: Compelling graphic representations of scientific data, especially displayed on NOAA's SOS, bring research results to a wide audience in an intuitive form, in support of NOAA's education and public outreach activities.
Outcome: This is in support of the Goal 3 objective to demonstrate global leadership in environmental issues and supports the general goal to solidify NOAA as an agency created to serve the general public.
(Elliot Lim)
NOAA Scientist Promotes the Use of Nighttime Earth Observations at Asian Symposia
Dr. Christopher Elvidge of the National Geophysical Data Center (NGDC) delivered two invited presentations in Japan and China on the topic of nighttime observations of artificial earth lighting. On July 10th, 2008 at the 2008 International Society for Photogrammetry and Remote Sensing (ISPRS) meeting in Beijing, Dr. Elvidge gave a presentation titled "How Virtual Globes are Revolutionizing Earth Observation Data Access and Integration." At the Sixth International Symposium on Integrated Field Science at Tohoku University, Sendai, Japan on July 26th, 2008, Dr. Elvidge gave a keynote address titled "A View of Humanity from Space." The next day he also presented a paper titled "Advances in DMSP Products and Services."
Significance: NOAA's active participation in international gatherings allows NOAA to share with colleagues from around the globe the current status of NOAA's continuing efforts in environmental science.
Outcome: This is in support of the Goal 3 objective to demonstrate global leadership in environmental issues.
( or 303-497-6121)
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