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NASA NTRS1991

Science requirements for a global change technology initiative architecture trade study

Science requirements for a Global Change Technology Initiative (GCTI) Architecture Trade Study were established by reviewing and synthesizing results from recent studies. A scientific rationale was adopted and used to identify a comprehensive set of measurables and their priorities. Spatial and temporal requirements for a number of measurement parameters were evaluated based on results from several working group studies. Science requirements were defined using these study results in conjunction with guidelines for investigating global changes over a time scale of decades to centuries. Requirements are given separately for global studies and regional process studies. For global studies, temporal requirements are for sampling every 1 to 12 hours for atmospheric and radiation parameters and 1 day or more for most Earth surface measurements. Therefore, the atmospheric measurables provide the most critical drivers for temporal sampling. Spatial sampling requirements vary from 1 km for land and ocean surface characteristics to 50 km for some atmospheric parameters. Thus, the land and ocean surface parameters have the more significant spatial variations and provide the most challenging spatial sampling requirements.

Suttles, John T.↗

NASA NTRS2021

Probabilistic Machine Learning Estimation of Ocean Mixed Layer Depth from Dense Satellite and Sparse In-Situ Observations

The ocean mixed layer plays an important role in the coupling between the upper ocean and atmosphere across a wide range of time scales. Estimation of the variability of the ocean mixed layer is therefore important for atmosphere-ocean prediction and analysis. The increasing coverage of in situ Argo profile data allows for an increasingly accurate analysis of the mixed layer depth (MLD) variability associated with deviations from the seasonal climatology. However, sampling rates are not sufficient to fully resolve subseasonal (<90 day) MLD variability. Yet, many multivariate observations-based analyses include implicit modeled subseasonal MLD variability. One analysis method is optimal interpolation of in situ data, but the interior analysis can be improved by leveraging surface data with regression or variational approaches. Here, we demonstrate how machine learning methods and satellite sea surface temperature, salinity, and height facilitate MLD estimation in a pilot study of two regions: the mid-latitude southern Indian and the eastern equatorial Pacific Oceans. We construct multiple machine learning architectures to produce weekly 1/2° gridded MLD anomaly fields (relative to a monthly climatology) with uncertainty estimates. We test multiple traditional and probabilistic machine learning techniques to compare both accuracy and probabilistic calibration. We validate our methodology by applying it to ocean model simulations. We find that incorporating sea surface data through a machine learning model improves the performance of spatiotemporal MLD variability estimation compared to optimal interpolation of Argo observations alone. These preliminary results are a promising first step for the application of machine learning to MLD prediction.

Machine Learning↗

NASA NTRS2003

Overview of the Convection and Moisture Experiment(CAMEX)

The goal of this paper is to present an overview of the Convection and Moisture Experiment including CAMEX-3 and CAMEX-4 field campaigns including field operations, aircraft platforms and instrumentation, aircraft missions, and data acquired during 1998 and 2001 field phases. A total of eight tropical storms and hurricanes were investigated during the CAMEX field campaigns including Bonnie, Danielle, Earl, and Georges during 1998 and Chantal, Erin, Gabrielle, and Humberto during 2001. Most of these storms were sampled with aircraft over the open ocean, but Bonnie (1998), Georges (1998), and Gabrielle (2001) also provided opportunities to monitor landfalling impacts. A few of the storms were sampled on multiple occasions during a course of several days. Most notably of these was Hurricane Humberto, which was sampled on three consecutive days during a cycle of both increasing and decreasing intensity change. Information collected for each of the eight CAMEX tropical storms as well the TRMM validation activities have been archived and are readily available for distribution at the CAMEX web site.

Kakar, Ramesh↗

NASA NTRS2019

The Concomitant Locomotion of the Microorganisms Inhabiting the Marine and Freshwater Niches of Antarctica’s South Shetland Islands During the Summer

During the late summer, the author sailed to the Antarctic South Shetland Islands to survey the microorganisms living in marine (tidal pools) and freshwater (moss saturated with snow melt) environmental niches. Equipped with a microscope to take video of samples within hours of collection to capture a pristine condition, we found a dense and diverse ecology that included species with unique patterns of locomotion. The Ocean Tramp cruised for 12 days (beginning January 30, 2019) through 588 nautical miles 677 miles) of the South Shetland Islands, between -62.9 to -65.1 latitude and -60.5 to -64.1 longitude.

Snyder, Jessica E.↗

NASA NTRS1990

Frequency-wavenumber spectrum for GATE phase I rainfields

The oceanic rainfall frequency-wavenumber spectrum and its associated space-time correlation have been evaluated from subsets of GATE phase I data. The records, of a duration of four days, were sampled at 15 minutes intervals in 4 x 4 km grid boxes over a 400 km diameter hexagon. In the low frequencies-low wavenumber region the results coincide with those obtained by using the stochastic model proposed by North and Nakomoto (1989). From the derived spectrum the inherent time and space scales of the stochastic model were determined to be approximately 13 hours and 36 km. The formalism proposed by North and Nakamoto was taken together with the derived spectrum to compute the mean square sampling error due to intermittent visits of a spaceborne sensor.

Nakamoto, Shoichiro↗

NASA NTRS2006

Overview of the Convection and Moisture Experiment (CAMEX)

This paper presents an overview of the Convection and Moisture Experiment (CAMEX), including the field operations, aircraft platforms and missions, instrumentation, and data acquired during 1998 and 2001 field campaigns. A total of eight tropical storms and hurricanes were investigated during the CAMEX field campaigns including Bonnie, Danielle, Earl, and Georges during 1998 and Chantal, Erin, Gabrielle, and Humberto during 2001. Most of these storms were sampled with aircraft over the open ocean, but Hurricanes Bonnie (1998), Georges (1998), and Gabrielle (2001) also provided opportunities to monitor landfalling impacts. A few of the storms were sampled on multiple occasions during a course of several days. Most notable of these was Hurricane Humberto, which was sampled on three consecutive days during a cycle of both increasing and decreasing intensity change. Information collected for each of the eight CAMEX tropical storms as well as the Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission validation activities are accessible via the CAMEX Web site and archived at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration Marshall Space Flight Center.

Kakar, Ramesh↗

DOE OSTI2018

Advances in the Recovery of Uranium from Seawater: Studies Under Real Ocean Conditions

The objective of this project was to move the testing of uranium adsorbents from the laboratory to the field. We were successfully able to test fibers in both a flume and ocean environment under varying conditions to quantify the adsorptive properties and uranium uptake of adsorbents under coastal ocean conditions. Through this testing we have identified numerous challenges to be overcome prior to large-scale deployment of these fibers This project began in Phase I with laboratory experiments examining the effects of flow rates and water filtration on the absorption of uranium to fibers in flowthrough columns. In this experiment we found that fibers adsorb most efficiently at a flow rate of 250 ml/min, on a per liter basis. However faster flow rates increase exposure volume and allowed for slightly greater total U absorption. Therefore a balance between current speeds that are too fast and potentially break down fibers and those that are slower will be important to consider, alongside bio-fouling and exposure time, when deciding which current regimes are best to place fibers in the ocean. Phase II examined biofouling, comparing exposure of fibers in filtered flume water to that in a coastal ocean environment. Results from the dock and flume parallel experiment indicate a strong effect of biofouling on the capacity of the adsorbent fibers to adsorb uranium towards the very end of the experiment. Dock and flume samples showed comparable adsorption rates with the flume maximum achieved at day 49 with an adsorbance of 3.4 g U/kg-ads while the dock maximum was reached at day 42 with an adsorbance of 2.7 g U/kg-ads. Biofouling mitigation techniques were also examined. A comparison of 5 m and 12 m samples showed less growth at 12 meters where there is less light as well as less growth on the copper cages, which are toxic to many marine organisms. Overall despite biofouling, particles and other elements present, the fibers adsorbed uranium up to 2.7 g U/kg-ads in our open water dock experiments. This is lower than the maximum achieved in the flume of 3.4 g U/kg-ads and much lower than rates observed with synthetic seawater in laboratory experiments. Phase III involved two parts: working at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) we examined the feasibility of reusing fibers after ocean deployment. Fiber reuse is an important consideration for operational costs associated with deployment. At present our data implies that reuse after open ocean exposure may not be significantly more effective than a single long deployment of fibers. The second part of Phase III involved collaboration with A. Slocum and M. Haji at MIT to examine the effects of various enclosures for fibers. This also involved testing a rotating system, designed to be deployed as part of an offshore wind turbine.

38 RADIATION CHEMISTRY, RADIOCHEMISTRY, AND NUCLEA↗

NASA NTRS2011

A New Global Mascon Solution Tuned for High-Latitude Ice Studies

A new global mascon solution has been developed with I-arc-degree spatial and IO-day temporal sampling. The global mas cons are estimated from the reduction of nearly 8 years of GRACE K-band range-rate data. Temporal and anisotropic spatial constraints have been applied for land, ocean and ice regions. The solution construction and tuning is focused towards the Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets (GIS and AIS) as well as the Gulf of Alaska mountain glaciers (GoA). Details of the solution development will be discussed, including the mascon parameter definitions, constraints, and the tuning of the constraint damping factor. Results will be presented, exploring the spatial and temporal variability of the ice sheets and GoA regions. A detailed error analysis will be discussed, including solution dependence on iteration, damping factor, forward modeling, and multitechnique comparisons. We also investigate the fundamental resolution of the solution and the spatial correlation of ice sheet inter-annual change. Finally, we discuss future improvements, including specific constraint application for the rest of the major land ice regions and improvements in solution regularization.

Luthcke, S. B.↗

NASA NTRS2000

Ocean Data from MODIS at the NASA Goddard DAAC

Terra satellite carrying the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) was successfully launched on December 18, 1999. Some of the 36 different wavelengths that MODIS samples have never before been measured from space. New ocean data products, which have not been derived on a global scale before, are made available for research to the scientific community. For example, MODIS uses a new split window in the four-micron region for the better measurement of Sea Surface Temperature (SST), and provides the unprecedented ability (683 nm band) to measure chlorophyll fluorescence. At full ocean production, more than a thousand different ocean products in three major categories (ocean color, sea surface temperature, and ocean primary production) are archived at the NASA Goddard Earth Sciences (GES) Distributed Active Archive Center (DAAC) at the rate of approx. 230GB/day. The challenge is to distribute such large volumes of data to the ocean community. It is achieved through a combination of public and restricted EOS Data Gateways, the GES DAAC Search and Order WWW interface, and an FTP site that contains samples of MODIS data. A new Search and Order WWW interface at http://acdisx.gsfc.nasa.gov/data/ developed at the GES DAAC is based on a hierarchical organization of data, will always return non-zero results. It has a very convenient geographical representation of five-minute data granule coverage for each day MODIS Data Support Team (MDST) continues the tradition of quality support at the GES DAAC for the ocean color data from the Coastal Zone Color Scanner (CZCS) and the Sea Viewing Wide Field-of-View Sensor (SeaWiFS) by providing expert assistance to users in accessing data products, information on visualization tools, documentation for data products and formats (Hierarchical Data Format-Earth Observing System (HDF-EOS)), information on the scientific content of products and metadata. Visit the MDST website at http://daac.gsfc.nasa.gov/CAMPAIGN DOCS/MODIS/index.html

Leptoukh, Gregory G.↗

DOE OSTI2019

Stochastic Parameterization of Subgrid-Scale Velocity Enhancement of Sea Surface Fluxes

Abstract Subgrid-scale (SGS) velocity variations result in gridscale sea surface flux enhancements that must be parameterized in weather and climate models. Traditional parameterizations are deterministic in that they assign a unique value of the SGS velocity flux enhancement to any given configuration of the resolved state. In this study, we assess the statistics of SGS velocity flux enhancement over a range of averaging scales (as a proxy for varying model resolution) through systematic coarse-graining of a convection-permitting atmospheric model simulation over the Indian Ocean and west Pacific warm pool. Conditioning the statistics of the SGS velocity flux enhancement on 1) the fluxes associated with the resolved winds and 2) the precipitation rate, we find that the lack of a separation between “resolved” and “unresolved” scales results in a distribution of flux enhancements for each configuration of the resolved state. That is, the SGS velocity flux enhancement should be represented stochastically rather than deterministically. The spatial and temporal statistics of the SGS velocity flux enhancement are investigated by using basic descriptive statistics and through a fit to an anisotropic space–time covariance structure. Potential spatial inhomogeneities of the statistics of the SGS velocity flux enhancement are investigated through regional analysis, although because of the relatively short duration of the simulation (9 days) distinguishing true inhomogeneity from sampling variability is difficult. Perspectives for the implementation of such a stochastic parameterization in weather and climate models are discussed.

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗

NASA NTRSDate not supplied

Overview of NASA's Ocean Color Instrument Solar Calibration Architecture, Pre-Launch Tests and Preliminary On-Orbit Results

Launched in February 2024, the PACE mission represents NASA’s next investment in ocean biology, clouds, and aerosol data records. A key feature of PACE is the inclusion of an advanced satellite radiometer known as the Ocean Color Instrument (OCI), a global mapping radiometer that combines multispectral and hyperspectral remote sensing. Like its predecessors, OCI will provide two day global coverage of TOA radiances. Unlike its predecessors, OCI will cover a spectral range from 340nm to 2260nm. Below 900nm, OCI will include two spectrometers that continuously span the ultraviolet to 600nm and 600nm to near-infrared spectral regions to provide hyperspectral radiances sampled every 2.5 nm, with a bandwidth of 5 nm for each channel. Wavelengths above 900nm are measured in seven discrete multispectral bands of varying bandwidths, six of which are at similar wavelengths to those on heritage missions to support both atmospheric and ocean color applications. Nominal spatial resolution is similar to the SeaWiFS instrument with 1050 m at nadir. As for SeaWiFS, the pixel size increases due to a ~20 degree tilt and as a function of scan angle. Variations in the radiometric sensitivity of each OCI channel over time will be monitored by solar diffuser measurements for short term instrument gain adjustments and independent lunar measurements for trend adjustments of long time periods, similar to the approach employed for the VIIRS instrument [4]. The OCI flight-unit was built at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center. At the time of this writing, OCI has completed on-orbit commissioning activities and normal science operations have begun. A key aspect of the OCI architecture is the capability to trend absolute and relative calibration changes over the course of mission life with solar calibration. Every 24 hours, the PACE spacecraft performs an inertial hold as the ground track nears the North Pole which orients a Quasi-Volume Diffuser (QVD) mounted on OCI towards the sun. By knowing the irradiance of the sun and the reflectivity of the target, the absolute radiance at the input to the OCI aperture can be computed as OCI scans the target. The allowable absolute uncertainty budget for each solar calibration measurement is 1.6% 1-sigma below 900nm at beginning of life (BOL) and the allowable relative uncertainty budget is ~0.26% 1-sigma. The Solar Calibration Assembly (SCA) consists of three targets selectable via a single mechanism which also opens a door. The targets consist of a Daily Bright Target (DBT), Monthly Bright Target (MBT), and Daily Dim Target (DDT). The bright targets are quartz QVDs with the monthly target being used to track the degradation of the daily target. The dim target is used to track CCD linearity using Progressive Time-Delay Integration (PTDI). A composite baffle is attached to the SCA housing aperture to block Earth shine and stray light from the spacecraft. The SCA assembly is mounted to a view port ~90° from OCI nadir. This paper provides an overview of driving solar calibration requirements, error-budgets and early trade studies which drove the solar calibration assembly (SCA) architecture and on-orbit maneuver. Measurements of the diffuser Bidirectional Reflectance Distribution Function (BRDF) at TNO, Netherlands and GSFC are briefly described. Optical modelling and test results at the sub-system and instrument level are included. Finally, preliminary measurements on-orbit are compared to pre-launch predictions.

Joseph J Knuble↗

NASA NTRSDate not supplied

Overview of NASA's Ocean Color Instrument Solar Calibration Architecture, Pre-Launch Tests and Preliminary On-Orbit Results

ocean color↗

NASA NTRS1990

Validation of the geostrophic method for estimating zonal currents at the equator from Geosat altimeter data

The applicability of satellite altimeter data for estimating zonal current variability at the equator is assessed using the meriodionally differenced form of the geostrophic balance. Estimates of geostrophic zonal flow anomalies in the equatorial Pacific have been deduced from 17-day collinear altimeter data during the first year of the Geosat Exact Repeat Mission. Altimeter-derived geostrophic estimates agree well with in situ zonal current variability. Comparison of flow-frequency near-surface zonal current observed from equatorial moorings at 165 deg E, 140 deg W, and 110 deg W yield correlations of 0.83, 0.85, and 0.51, respectively, with a mean rms difference of 23 cm/sec. The inclusion of up to 11 ascending and descending Geosat tracks within the 9-deg band for every 17-day repeat effectively reduced the temporal sampling interval to 1.5 days at 165 deg E and 140 deg W. The 6.8-km along track spacing of the altimeter measurements provides sufficient resolution for the effective filtering of small-scale meridional noise, both instrumental and oceanic.

Picaut, Joel↗

NASA NTRS1995

Optical characterization of the oceanic unicellular cyanobacterium Synechococcus grown under a day-night cycle in natural irradiance

The optical properties of the ocenanic cyanobacterium Synechococcus (clone WH8103) were examined in a nutrient-replete laboratory culture grown under a day-night cycle in natural irradiance. Measurements of the spectral absorption and beam attenuation coefficients, the size distribution of cells in suspension, and microscopic analysis of samples were made at intervals of 2-4 hours for 2 days. These measurements were used to calculate the optical properties at the level of a single 'mean' cell representative of the acutal population, specifically, the optical cross sections for spectral absorption bar-(sigma(sub a)), scattering bar-sigma(sub b))(lambda), and attentuation bar-(sigma(sub c))(lambda). In addition, concurrent determinations of chlorophyll a and particulate organic carbon allowed calculation of the Chl a- and C-specific optical coefficients. The refractive index of cells was derived from the observed data using a theory of light absorption and scattering by homogeneous spheres. Low irradiance because of cloudy skies resulted in slow division rates of cells in the culture. The percentage of dividing cells was unusually high (greater than 30%) throughout the experiment. The optical cross sections varied greatly over a day-night cycle, with a minimum near dawn or midmorning and maximum near dusk. During daylight hours, bar-(sigma(sub b)) and bar-(sigma(sub c)) can increase more than twofold and bar-(sigma(sub a) by as much as 45%. The real part of the refractive index n increaed during the day; changes in n had equal or greater effect than the varying size distribution on changes in bar-(sigma(sub c)) and bar-(sigma(sub b)). The contribution of changes in n to the increase of bar-(sigma(sub c))(660) during daylight hours was 65.7% and 45.1% on day 1 and 2, respectively. During the dark period, when bar-(sigma(sub c))(660) decreased by a factor of 2.9, the effect of decreasing n was dominant (86.3%). With the exception of a few hours during the second light period, the imaginary part of the refractive index n' showed little variation over a day-night cycle, and bar-(sigma(sub a)) was largely controlled by variations in cell size. The real part of the refractive index at lambda = 660 nm was correlated with the intracellular C concentration and the imaginary part at lambda = 678 nm with the intracellular Chl a concentration. The C-specfic attenuation coefficient showed significant diel variability, which has implications for the estimation of oceanic primary production from measurements of diel variability in beam attenuation. This study provides strong evidence that diel variability is an important component of the optical characterization of marine phytoplankton.

Stramski, Dariusz↗

NASA NTRS1985

Ground-based nitric oxide measurements at Wallops Island, Virginia

In July of 1983, ambient measurements of nitric oxide (NO) were obtained at Wallops Island, VA, during the NASA GTE/CITE ground-based instrument intercomparison field study. The instrument, which was designed for measurements in the remote troposphere from an aircraft platform, is briefly described. Ten days of ambient air observations showed broadly uniform diurnal behavior, although considerable variability was encountered. Two distinct synoptic meteorological conditions resulted in markedly different levels of nitric oxide abundance. When the local winds were from the north to west sectors, which placed the sampling site within 130 to 300 km of large urban centers, the midday mixing ratios were typically in the range of 200-300 pptv. In contrast, when the air mass sustained a 1- or 2-day period over the Atlantic Ocean, the mixing ratios were substantially lower and in the 50-60 pptv range.

Carroll, M. A.↗

NASA NTRS2012

Evaluating Nighttime CALIOP 0.532 micron Aerosol Optical Depth and Extinction Coefficient Retrievals

NASA Cloud Aerosol Lidar with Orthogonal Polarization (CALIOP) Version 3.01 5-km nighttime 0.532 micron aerosol optical depth (AOD) datasets from 2007 are screened, averaged and evaluated at 1 deg X 1 deg resolution versus corresponding/co-incident 0.550 micron AOD derived using the US Navy Aerosol Analysis and Prediction System (NAAPS), featuring two-dimensional variational assimilation of quality-assured NASA Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) and Multi-angle Imaging Spectroradiometer (MISR) AOD. In the absence of sunlight, since passive radiometric AOD retrievals rely overwhelmingly on scattered radiances, the model represents one of the few practical global estimates available from which to attempt such a validation. Daytime comparisons, though, provide useful context. Regional-mean CALIOP vertical profiles of night/day 0.532 micron extinction coefficient are compared with 0.523/0.532 micron ground-based lidar measurements to investigate representativeness and diurnal variability. In this analysis, mean nighttime CALIOP AOD are mostly lower than daytime (0.121 vs. 0.126 for all aggregated data points, and 0.099 vs. 0.102 when averaged globally per normalised 1 deg. X 1 deg. bin), though the relationship is reversed over land and coastal regions when the data are averaged per normalised bin (0.134/0.108 vs. 0140/0.112, respectively). Offsets assessed within single bins alone approach +/- 20 %. CALIOP AOD, both day and night, are higher than NAAPS over land (0.137 vs. 0.124) and equal over water (0.082 vs. 0.083) when averaged globally per normalised bin. However, for all data points inclusive, NAAPS exceeds CALIOP over land, coast and ocean, both day and night. Again, differences assessed within single bins approach 50% in extreme cases. Correlation between CALIOP and NAAPS AOD is comparable during both day and night. Higher correlation is found nearest the equator, both as a function of sample size and relative signal magnitudes inherent at these latitudes. Root mean square deviation between CALIOP and NAAPS varies between 0.1 and 0.3 globally during both day/night. Averaging of CALIOP along-track AOD data points within a single NAAPS grid bin improves correlation and RMSD, though day/night and land/ocean biases persist and are believed systematic. Vertical profiles of extinction coefficient derived in the Caribbean compare well with ground-based lidar observations, though potentially anomalous selection of a priori lidar ratios for CALIOP retrievals is likely inducing some discrepancies. Mean effective aerosol layer top heights are stable between day and night, indicating consistent layer-identification diurnally, which is noteworthy considering the potential limiting effects of ambient solar noise during day.

aerosol optical depth↗

NASA NTRS2020

Designing an Optimal Ensemble Strategy for GMAO S2S Forecast System

The NASA Global Modeling and Assimilation Office (GMAO) Sub-seasonal to Seasonal (S2S) prediction system is being readied for a major upgrade. An important factor in successful extended range forecasting is the definition of the ensemble. Our overall strategy is to run a relatively large ensemble of about 40 members up to 3 months (focusing on the sub-seasonal forecast problem), after which we sub-sample the ensemble, and continue the forecast with about 10 members (up to 12 months). Here we present the results of our testing of various ways to generate the initial perturbations and the validation of a stratified sampling approach for choosing the members of the smaller ensemble. For the initialization of the ensemble we propose a combination of lagged and burst initial conditions. To generate perturbations for the burst ensemble members we used scaled differences of pairs of analysis states (chosen randomly from the corresponding season) separated by 1-10 days. We consider perturbing separately the atmosphere and the ocean, or both. By varying the separation times between the analysis states, we are able to produce perturbations that resemble well-known modes of variability. Focusing on the ENSO SST indices, we found that all types of perturbations are important for the ensemble spread with, however, considerable differences in the timing of the impacts on spread for the atmospheric and oceanic perturbations.Our initial (larger) ensemble size was determined so as to maximize the skill of predicting some of the leading modes of boreal winter atmospheric modes (namely the NAO, PNA and AO). Since it is not feasible for us to run with the larger ensemble beyond about 3 months, we employ a stratified sampling procedure that identifies the emerging directions of error growth to subset the ensemble. By comparing the results from the stratified ensemble with that of the randomly sampled ensemble of the same size, we find that the former provides substantially better estimates the mean of the original large ensemble.

Borovikov, Anna↗

NASA NTRS2001

Exploration of the Eltanin Impact Area (Bellingshausen Sea): Expedition ANT XVIII5a

The impact of the Eltanin asteroid into the Bellingshausen Sea (2.15 Ma) is the only known impact in a deep-ocean (approx. 5 km) basin. On 26 March 2001, the FS Polarstern returned to the impact area during expedition ANT XVIII/5a. Over a period of 14 days, this region was explored by detailed bathymetric mapping, acoustic profiling of sediment deposits, and direct sampling with 18 piston cores and four gravity cores. Preliminary shipboard examination of microfossils showed that sixteen of the piston cores and three gravity cores contained sediments at least as old as the impact event and have a high probability of containing a record of the disturbances caused by the impact. During the expedition, portions of eleven piston cores were opened for preliminary examination of the impact deposits. Visual examination of cores and microscopic identification of suspect impact melt particles were were used to identify ejecta and X-ray radiographs of the opened core segments permitted analysis of sediment structures. Impact deposits were found in nine of the eleven opened cores, and a similar success rate is anticipated in the seven cores remaining to be opened. These preliminary observations indicate that the highest concentrations of meteoritic ejecta and the largest particle sizes appear to occur in the region north of the San Martin seamounts. Recovered debris includes cm-sized melt rocks and a 2.5 cm meteorite. This expedition has confirmed the presence of high concentrations of meteoritic ejecta across a region at least as large as 10(exp 5) sq km. Quantitative analyses of ejecta distribution within this region will require further study, but previous estimates of 1 km for the minimum diameter of the Eltanin asteroid, appear safe.

Gersonde, Rainer↗