Thematic Area 4 - EARTH OBSERVATION and MODELS

The ‘Blue Marble’, taken by NASA/Apollo 17 crew in 1972 The main activities of the thematic area Earth Observation (EO) and Polar Ecosystem Modeling include remote and proximal sensing, spatial analysis, thematic mapping, and geographic and environmental knowledge organization. The activity focuses on three main methodological pillars: remote and in situ observations, information organization, and representation by numerical and conceptual models. The Spegazzini Glacier (Los Glaciares National Park, Santa Cruz, Argentina, January 2010), together with the Upsala and the Perito Moreno Glaciers, feeds the Lago Argentino in the Los Glaciares National Park © Chiara Venier CNR-ISP The research of this thematic area focuses on the responses of polar ecosystems to changes in air and sea temperature, in polar ice caps, in sea level height, and in persistence and thickness of snowpack and ice, also through the comparisons of climate belts. Analyses also cover permafrost evolution, coastal erosion, accretion processes, release and segregation of climate-altering gases, biogeochemical cycles, and biodiversity. The observational methodologies aim to detect environmental and climate dynamics at different spatial and temporal scales by identifying and studying multiple essential variables and their biological and geophysical interactions by integrating information from different platforms. The continuous comparison allows the combination of spatial and ecological models with observations.

 

Example of hyeraricacal structure for the term "ice" in the thesaurus "SnowTerm" for the Cryosphere The team has a group dedicated to organizing multilingual terminological knowledge, thesauri, and metadata to support data description and environmental information, focusing on polar environments. The subject area develops, by Findable Accessible Interoperable Reusable (FAIR) principles, data chains and products to support the study of terrestrial, aquatic, and cryosphere systems and the development of interoperable GIS, thematic mapping, and operational services. Figure 1: the Spegazzini Glacier (Los Glaciares National Park, Santa Cruz, Argentina, January 2010), together with the Upsala and the Perito Moreno Glaciers, feeds the Lago Argentino in the Los Glaciares National Park, in this photo, the calving-type glacier front is visible, characterized by abundant seracs, which can reach 135 m in height.

 

Main ERC Panels:
• LS8 - Environmental Biology, Ecology and Evolution
• PE10 - Earth System Science
• SH7 - Human Mobility, Environment, and Space
• SH2 - Institutions, Values, Environment and Space

Referents: Francesco De Biasio, Francesco Filiciotto, Emiliana Valentini, Matteo Zucchetta
 
Contacts: info-observation AT isp.cnr.it

Sub-Theme

ministero Ministero degli Affari Esteri e della Cooperazione Internazionale
L'Italia e l’Artico
L’Italia e l’Antartide

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   CNR-ISP
   National Research Council
   Institute of Polar Sciences
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