Leaves represent extremely rough surfaces, so you get a very bright backscatter from rainforests. Because different types of ice and snow also absorb and reflect the radar in different ways, Long can use scatterometer data to distinguish between dry snow grains, hardened glacial ice and moisture-heavy snowpack. The researchers can also see where ice melts and refreezes. What we observed in our studies of Greenland was that the line where the snow melts has moved uphill, which indicates some warming and is evidence of change. Long says stability of the ice pack is a primary concern because polar ice sheets regulate the earth's temperatures.
Ice sheets are sensitive indicators of climate change.
Now that QuikScat has been launched, Long and his students are working with NASA scientists to help calibrate the device and check its reliability. From a ground site in New Mexico, they will record the satellite passes and check the accuracy of the device to make sure it is operating at the correct speed and power. Student researchers can also take credit for writing some of QuikScat's computer processing code and for creating reference tables that will aid in interpretation of the data. When he was with the Jet Propulsion Lab, Long was the senior technical designer for NASA's original scatterometer. He has published dozens of papers on applications of scatterometer data and methods to improve data resolution and processing.