Visiting researcher updates the New Zealand glacier inventory
The Antarctic Research Centre would like to welcome a new visiting academic, Dr Sabine Baumann. Sabine is guest researcher from the Technical University of Munich, Germany, where she is undertaking a DFG Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (German Research Foundation) -granted post doctoral fellowship project entitled 'Change of snow cover and its implications on arctic permafrost by using gravimetric satellite data.'
The DFG also awarded Sabine a Research Fellowship to update the New Zealand glacier inventory. She is hosted by the ARC's Deputy Director, Associate Professor Andrew Mackintosh.
The current inventory is from 1978, compiled by Dr Trevor Chinn (NIWA). Most of the work can be done using remote sensing but Sabine will also go down to the West Coast for field work to see the glaciers. Due to the partly heavy debris-cover, it is not easy to distinguish between glacier and the surrounding area on the satellite images. Indeed, this can sometimes also be a challenge out in the field. The new inventory should not only include 'usual' parameters such as glacier area and length, but also assumptions of debris thickness or size of glacier lakes.
At the end of the project, it will be possible for glacier evolution to be assessed by comparing the old and the new glacier inventory.
Sabine will be here until the end of May and then will complete her inventory update from Munich. The new inventory will hopefully be available from GLIMS: Global Land Ice Measurements from Space by end of the year.
If you would like to contact Sabine, she is based in Room 515, Cotton Building, Gate 7, Kelburn Pararde, Kelburn Campus.