Arctic Boreal Vulnerability Experiment

[mati]

Climate change in the Arctic and Boreal region is unfolding faster than anywhere else on Earth, resulting in reduced Arctic sea ice, thawing of permafrost soils, decomposition of long- frozen organic matter, widespread changes to lakes, rivers, coastlines, and alterations of ecosystem structure and function. NASA's Terrestrial Ecology Program is conducting a major field campaign, the Arctic-Boreal Vulnerability Experiment (ABoVE), in Alaska and western Canada, for 8 to 10 years, starting in 2015.

http://above.nasa.gov/

[Clare]

Background article related to this:
http://e360.yale.edu/feature/the_rapid_and_startling_decline_of_worlds_vast_boreal_forests/2919/
"Many scientists, in fact, are deeply concerned about the state of the world’s largest forest. The Arctic and the boreal region are warming twice as fast as other parts of the world. Permafrost is thawing and even burning, fires are burning unprecedented acres of forest, and insect outbreaks have gobbled up increasing numbers of trees. Climate zones are moving north ten times faster than forests can migrate. And this comes on top of increased industrial development of the boreal, from logging to oil and gas. The same phenomena are seen in Russia, Scandanavia, and Finland.

These disturbing signals of a forest in steep decline are why NASA just launched a large-scale research project called ABoVE — Arctic Boreal Vulnerability Experiment, a “major field campaign” with 21 field projects...
The boreal forest is breaking apart. The question is what will replace it?’ says one scientist. over the next decade. But the studies will confirm in detail what many know is well underway."