Glossary ... for newbies and others

[DungeonMaster]

I realized that it may be difficult for our new readers to understand most of abbreviations used here. So I suggest making a glossary !

For more terms you can refer to NSIDC's Glossary. Or peruse the Global Cryosphere Watch Glossary (4141 entries from 26 sources; over 2200 are unique).

Please add terms and definitions below, I'll try to compile them in this first message (except the jokes). Please also provide links when you can.

An other Glossary is available for Antarctic here

ABW - Arctic bottom water

AMO - Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation

AMOC - Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation

AMSR - Advanced Microwave Scanning Radiometer

AO - Arctic Oscillation

ASI - Arctic Sea Ice - all the Ice floating in the Arctic Seas.

ASIB - Arctic Sea Ice Blog

ASIF - Arctic Sea Ice Forum

ASIG - Arctic Sea Ice Graphs page

AW - Atlantic water

AWI - Alfred Wegener Institute, an important research center in Germany

AWP - Albedo-Warming Potential

BOE - Blue Ocean Event

BS - Bering Strait (or when someone is talking nonsense) (or Blog Science)

CAA - Canadian Arctic Archipelago - Canadian islands in the North of America: Ellesmere, Victoria, Baffin and many others, except Greenland. CAA main waterways include the PGAS, Peary Channel, Amundsen Gulf, McClintock Channel and Gulf of Boothia.

CAB - Central Arctic Basin, the central part of the Arctic Ocean, bordering the CAA, Beaufort, Chukchi, East Siberian, Laptev, Kara, Barents and Greenland seas. It has several definitions of borders, mainly a smaller CAB (NSIDC/MASIE maps) or larger CAB (CT/Wipneus maps) versions, depending on demarcations with the other seas. It includes the Lincoln Sea and the Wandel Sea.

CAPIE - Cryosphere Today area per IJIS extent (crude melt pond and compactness measure)

CB - Century break, a drop of more than 100K (one hundred thousand) km2 in sea ice area or extent

CIS - Canadian Ice Service

CONUS - Continental (or contiguous, or conterminous) U.S., meaning the 48 states, not including Alaska

CR - Climate Reanalyzer

CT - Cryosphere Today, a now-defunct website

DJF - December January February - winter (Meteorological calendar, northern hemisphere)

DLR - Downwelling Longwave (infra-red) Radiation

DMI - Danish Meteorological Institute

DRA - Data release area, the previously top secret US Navy submarine data showing measured thickness of sea ice. Released to scientists in 1992 by then Vice President of the US Al Gore.

DTC - Digital Temperature (or Thermistor) Chain, in the context of ice mass balance buoys

DTR - Diurnal Temperature Range - the difference between daily max and min temperatures.

EAIS - East Antarctic Ice Sheet

ECMWF (AKA Euro) - European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts

EEI - Earth energy imbalance, the difference between the amount of solar energy absorbed by Earth and the amount of energy the planet radiates to space as heat.

ENSO - El Nino Southern Oscillation

EPO - Eastern Pacific Oscillation

ESAS - East Siberian Arctic Shelf

ESS - East Siberian Sea

FDD - Freezing Degree Days. Sum of temps in C below freezing. Provides integrated intensity of cold.

FJL - Franz Josef Land, a group of islands to the east of Svalbard

FRIS - Filchner-Ronne Ice Shelf, Atlantic part of WAIS (Filchner the eastern outlet, Ronne the western by the peninsula (both having gently sloping submarine outlets)

FYI - First-year ice

GAC -  Great Arctic Cyclone

GAAC - Great Arctic Anti-Cyclone (result of persistent high pressure)

GCM - General Circulation Model, or Global Climate Model. The sort of model used to make IPCC temperature projections.

GFS - Global Forecast System (US weather forecast model)

gice - One of the PIOMAS output files, containing the distribution of thicknesses in each grid cell

GIS - Greenland Ice Sheet

HFO - Heavy fuel oil

High Arctic - "hard to melt" arctic seas, including the CAB, CAA, Beaufort Sea, Chukchi Sea, ESS, Laptev Sea, Kara Sea

hPa - hectopascal, a unit of pressure

ICESat - Ice Cloud and land Elevation Satellite. The precursor to CryoSat 2, used to validate PIOMAS

IJIS - IARC-JAXA Information System run by the International Arctic Research Center (IARC), University of Alaska, and the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA)

IMB - Ice Mass Balance buoy

IS - Ice stream

JAXA - Japan Aerospace eXploration Agency

JIS - Jakobshavn Isbrae (or Ice Stream)

JJA - June July August - summer (Meteorological calendar, northern hemisphere)

LFO - Light fuel oil

MAM - March April May - spring (Meteorological calendar, northern hemisphere)

MIZ - Marginal Ice Zone

MSLP - Mean Sea Level Pressure

MYI - Multi-Year Ice

NAO - North Atlantic Oscillation

NAVGEM -  Navy Global Environmental Model

NEW -  Northeast Water Polynya

NH - Northern Hemisphere.

NEGIS - North-East Greenland Ice Stream

NOW - North Water Polynya

NP - North Pole

NSR - Northern Sea Route

NWP - North West Passage

OLR - Outgoing Longwave (infra-red) Radiation

OMG - Oceans are Melting Greenland

OSISAF - Ocean and Sea Ice Satellite Application Facility

OWFE - Open Water Formation Efficiency. A measure of the melt season thinning that leads to a percentage of open water in the Arctic ocean.

PAC -  Persistent Arctic Cyclone

PDO - Pacific Decadal Oscillation

Peripheral Seas - "easy to melt" arctic seas - Sea of Okhotsk, Bering Sea, Hudson Bay, Baffin  Bay, Gulf of St. Lawernce, Greenland Sea, Barents Sea

PGAS - Prince Gustav Adolf Sea, in the CAA bordering the CAB

PICT - PIOMAS volume per Cryosphere Today area (crude average thickness measure)

PIG - Pine Island Glacier, Blocking one specific steep and deep outlet of WAIS below sea level, and the other sensitive outlet nearby is Thwaites glacier.

PIJAMAS - PIOMAS volume per JAXA sea ice extent (crude average thickness measure)

PIOMAS - Pan Arctic Ice Ocean Modelling and Assimilation System.

PNA - Pacific North American pattern

PSC - Polar Science Center, University of Washington (PIOMAS)

PV - Polar Vortex

QBO - Quasi Biennial Oscillation

RILE - Rapid Ice Loss Event. An event where area or extent shows marked drops faster than the long term trend, these can take years to play out in the models and rarely end with a totally ice free Arctic.

RIS - Ross Ice Shelf, Pacific part of WAIS (with at least 3 gently sloping submarine outlets)

SAT - Surface air temperature

SFW - Stratospheric Final Warming

SH - Southern Hemisphere.

SIA - Sea ice area

SIC - Sea ice concentration

SIE - Sea ice extent

SIMB - Seasonal Ice Mass Balance buoy

SIT - Sea ice thickness

SIV - Sea ice volume

SLP - Sea level pressure

SMB - Surface mass balance

SMOS - Soil Moisture and Ocean Salinity, ESA satellite

SOI - Southern Oscillation Index

SON - September October November - autumn (Meteorological calendar, northern hemisphere)

SoO - Sea of Okhotsk

SST - Sea surface temperature

SSTa - Sea surface temperature anomaly

SSW - Sudden Stratospheric Warming

SW - ShortWave radiation - sunlight otherwise known as insolation.

SWE - Snow Water Equivalent

TDD - Thawing Degree Days.  Sum of temps in C above freezing. Provides integrated intensity of warmth.

THC - Thermohaline Circulation

TPV - Tropopause Polar Vortex

TPW - Total Precipitable Water

UKMO - United Kingdom Meteorological Office

WAA - Warm Air Advection

WACC - Warm Arctic, Cold Continents

WAIS - The whole West Antarctic Ice Sheet

WIPD - Whole ice pack detachment

ZIS - Zachariae Isstrom (or Ice Stream)

[Neven]

I set it to sticky. 

Here are a few:

SIC - sea ice concentration

SIE - sea ice extent

SIA - sea ice area

SoO - Sea of Okhotsk

ESS - East Siberian Sea

CT - Cryosphere Today

CAPIE - Cryosphere Today area per IJIS extent (crude melt pond and compactness measure)

PICT - PIOMAS volume per Cryosphere Today area (crude average thickness measure)

AW - Atlantic water

BS - Bering Strait (or when someone is talking nonsense)

ASIB - Arctic Sea Ice Blog

ASIF - Arctic Sea Ice Forum

ASIG - Arctic Sea Ice Graphs page

[Pmt111500]

The Antarctica Main Glaciers (or Ice Streams)

*FRIS - Filchner-Ronne Ice Shelf, Atlantic part of WAIS (Filchner the eastern outlet, Ronne the western by the peninsula (both having gently sloping submarine outlets)
*RIS - Ross Ice Shelf, Pacific part of WAIS (with at least 3 gently sloping submarine outlets)

The 'backdoors'(aka 'weak underbelly') to both of them (There's a gap in the Antarctic Mountains) are:
*PIG - Pine Island Glacier, Blocking one specific steep and deep outlet of WAIS below sea level, and the other sensitive outlet nearby is
*Thwaites glacier. These are also the most northern outlets of  the

*WAIS - The whole West Antarctic Ice Sheet

for 'completeness' sake...
*EAIS - East Antarctic Ice Sheet with two largest outlets
*Mertz Glacier (that shed the C-28 iceberg just 2010) and
*Lambert Glacier (to
*Amery Ice Shelf towards Indian Ocean)
and numerous minor ones (most sit firmly on rock.)

[ChrisReynolds]

Both of these two are from papers - so unless you want me to link to papers I can't provide a general info link.

RILE - Rapid Ice Loss Event. An event where area or extent shows marked drops faster than the long term trend, these can take years to play out in the models and rarely end with a totally ice free Arctic.
OWFE - Open Water Formation Efficiency. A measure of the melt season thinning that leads to a percentage of open water in the Arctic ocean.

PIOMAS - Pan Arctic Ice Ocean Modelling and Assimilation System.
http://psc.apl.washington.edu/wordpress/research/projects/projections-of-an-ice-diminished-arctic-ocean/

ICESat - Ice Cloud and land Elevation Satellite. The precursor to CryoSat 2, used to validate PIOMAS.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ICESat

DRA - Data release area, the previously top secret US Navy submarine data showing measured thickness of sea ice. Release to scientists in 1992 by then Vice President of the US Al Gore.
http://nsidc.org/scicex/history.html

GCM - General Circulation Model, or Global Climate Model. The sort of model used to make IPCC temperature projections.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_circulation_model


Seasons:
Meteorological calendar, northern hemisphere.
DJF - December January February - winter.
MAM - March April May - spring.
JJA - June July August - summer
SON - September October November - autumn.

NH - Northern Hemisphere.
SH - Southern Hemisphere.

FUBAR - the state of the arctic ice pack in recent years. 

PS - there was a map of the Arctic people were recommending. Perhaps it would be an idea to include resources like that here. Or maybe we need a 'backgrounder' sticky post for newbies.

[ChrisReynolds]

Atmospheric and Ocean Modes.

AO - Arctic Oscillation
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arctic_oscillation

NAO - North Atlantic Oscillation
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_Atlantic_oscillation

ENSO - El Nino Southern Oscillation
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southern_Oscillation_Index

PDO - Pacific Decadal Oscillation
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pacific_decadal_oscillation

PNA - Pacific North American pattern
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pacific%E2%80%93North_American_teleconnection_pattern

QBO - Quasi Biennial Oscillation
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quasi_biennial_oscillation

AMO - Atlantic Multi Decadal Oscillation
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atlantic_multidecadal_oscillation

some others

DTR - Diurnal Temperature Range - the difference between daily max and min temperatures.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diurnal_temperature_range

OLR - Outgoing Longwave (infra-red) Radiation
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Outgoing_longwave_radiation

DLR - Downwelling Longwave (infra-red) Radiation

SW - ShortWave radiation - sunlight otherwise known as insolation.

[ivica]

FYI - First year ice
MYI - Multy year ice

(Fast Ice, Nilas... covered by  NSIDC's Glossary)

IS - Ice stream
JIS - Jakobshavn ice stream
ZIS - Zacharian ice stream
NEGIS - North-east Greenland ice stream

KISS - Keep it simple, stupid   :-)

[Jim Williams]

FUBAR - the state of the arctic ice pack in recent years. 

Technically, that is: Fucked Up Beyond All Recognition.  The Arctic Ice Pack is merely an example.

[DungeonMaster]

OK, first set of compilation done (jokes apart).

Please add links when you can...

I'd also love to have clear and simple graphs about :
- AO and AMO,
- extent and area,
If anyone can provide some images or links ? Perhaps on Wikipedia ?

Ivica, what is ZIS ?? Never read about this...

[ChrisReynolds]

I've a long weekend coming up, will add links then.

[ivica]

...Ivica, what is ZIS ?? Never read about this...

ZIS is in article "Zachariæ Isstrøm Further Retreat" with link given by Jim Hunt here:
https://forum.arctic-sea-ice.net/index.php/topic,42.msg307.html#msg307

[JMP]

Many thanks! to Nevin and everyone! 
Glossary = Great idea!

Just now needed to look up:
SST  = Sea Surface Temperature
 

Stumbled upon this list: http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/General/mhdj_acronyms3.html 
Thought it might be a help.   

-John

[Jim Pettit]

Stumbled upon this list: http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/General/mhdj_acronyms3.html 
Thought it might be a help.   

I'll give them props for these two:
MERMAid:   Metadata Enterprise Resource Management Aid
SeaBASS:   SeaWiFS Bio-optical Archive and Storage System

...but:
SANTA CLAuS: Studies in ANTarcticA: Coupled Linkages Among micro(u)organismS

Seriously? 

Well, despite the obvious stretches, it's a great resource, anyway...

[frankendoodle]

Common chemical abbr.

CO2 = Carbon Dioxide

CH4 = Methane

SO2 = Sulfur Dioxide

Methane Clathrate =  Methane Yydrate, Hydromethane, methane ice, fire ice, natural gas hydrate, or gas hydrate. A solid clathrate compound (more specifically, a clathrate hydrate) in which a large amount of methane is trapped within a crystal structure of water, forming a solid similar to ice (CH4•5.75H2O)

Common Mass/Volume abbr.

ppm = parts per million (mass/molar fraction)

mkm2 = one million square kilometers

Mt = Megatonne = one million metric tonnes (unit of mass) = MMT (million metric tonnes)

Gt = Gigatonne = one billion metric tonnes (unit of mass) i.e. 24.5 GtCO2 (twenty four billion, five-hundered million tonnes of carbon dioxide)

km3 = one cubic kilometer (unit of volume)

1 km3 of water = 1 kGt of water
1.0 km3 of ice = 0.90 Gt

Common Weather abbr.

hPa = 100 Pascals (unit of pressure) = 100 N/m2 (100 Newtons per square meter) Normal pressure usually borders around 1000 hPa

kPa = 1000 Pascals

Bar = 100,000 Pa or 1000 hPa or 100 kPa

millibar = Mbar = 0.001 of a Bar 

[Rick Aster]

A couple of weather terms:

SLP - sea level pressure
SSW - sudden stratospheric warming http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sudden_stratospheric_warming

And a link for hPa: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pascal_%28unit%29

[lanevn]

Anyone know minimum size of polynya to be excluded from SIE number?

[PhilGChapman]

CAB - Central Arctic Basin

[Tor Bejnar]

Arctic maps are referenced in the ASIF "Background » Arctic Maps" thread:  http://forum.arctic-sea-ice.net/index.php/topic,417.0.html  edit: other maps are available on the Arctic Sea Ice Graphs (ASIG) site linked at the top of this page.

[Rick Aster]

albedo: the reflectivity of a surface, measured as the ratio of reflected light to incident light, with 0 indicating perfect absorption and 1 indicating perfect reflection. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albedo

Useful reference values:

.04 charcoal
.50-.70 sea ice
.80-.90 fresh snow

[Peter Ellis]

Anyone know minimum size of polynya to be excluded from SIE number?

It doesn't work like that. 

For SIE, the sensor looks at a given pixel of ice and measures the percentage of ice within that pixel.  If it's over 15%, then it counts as ice, and if it's below 15% it counts as open water.

So in theory, you could have  a pixel that's 15.00001% covered in ice, and there happens to be a 100 metre square polynya within the ice-covered part, which would push it down below the threshold and thus the whole pixel would now be counted as water.

Alternatively, you could have a long thin polynya (say a crack that's 1km wide and 50km long) that stretches across multiple pixels but doesn't bring any of them below the 15% threshold, in which case it would be entirely missed by the SIE measure.

Sea ice area weights each pixel by the percentage coverage, and so will in theory pick up polynyas of any size, no matter how big or small - however that measure is easily confused by melt ponds.

[chalambar]

What is meant by the term, "export"?

[Neven]

Hi chalambar, and welcome.

Export is transport of ice floes out of the Arctic Ocean towards the Atlantic Ocean through Fram Strait (between Greenland and Svalbard) and Victoria Channel (between Svalbard and Franz Josef Land) where waters are warmer and the ice melts completely.

There can also be some export through Nares Strait towards Baffin Bay, or through the channels and straits of the Canadian Arctic Archipelago, but melting out is not guaranteed.

[chalambar]

Thank you, Neven.

[Nick_Naylor]

I hope this is the right locations, as this is not exactly a glossary item, but here is a very nice primer on sea ice formation and behavior:

https://notendur.hi.is/thorstur/teaching/glac/sea_ice.pdf

[Neven]

Neven,

I just wanted to the time zone displayed in this forum.

Sourabh, if you go to Profile->Summary->Modify Profile->Look and Layout, you'll see the time that is displayed for this forum (it's CET) and offset it to display your time zone.

Next time ask under The Forum in the Off-topic Category, please.

[Sourabh]

Okie dokie. Thanks

[Tor Bejnar]

What does "Charctic" mean?  As in "Charctic SIE loss today is 1.63 million Km^2"
and http://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/charctic-interactive-sea-ice-graph/

There are some other funny jargon words used on this blog.  Sure wish folks who use them would define them here!

[Peter Ellis]

It doesn't mean anything special, it's just a title for one particular graph produced by the NSIDC (which you linked).  It simply stands for CHart of the ARCTIC.

[Tor Bejnar]

Thanks.  I thought that might be the case, but I couldn't find a definition anywhere (even on NSIDC pages).

[SCYetti]

glos·sa·ry
An alphabetical list of terms or words found in or relating to a specific subject, text, or dialect, with explanations; a brief dictionary.

[RoxTheGeologist]

Please can you add a definition for "Century Break"?

Okay. Yes. I am a noob and my google skills all seem to come full circle.

[Neven]

Welcome, Rox. I've added the definition and here's a link to the provenance of the term.

[RoxTheGeologist]

Thanks Neven! It did have me snookered.

[andy_t_roo]

a low resolution labeled picture showing which areas of the arctic are refereed to by each of the area graphs would be nice

as eg : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barents_Sea doesn't list actually what area is talked about, but we're quite happy to list the amount of ice in it at https://sites.google.com/site/arcticseaicegraphs/regional

perhaps something like a labeled version of the following?

[Meirion]

Does this help?

[Neven]

a low resolution labeled picture showing which areas of the arctic are refereed to by each of the area graphs would be nice

as eg : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barents_Sea doesn't list actually what area is talked about, but we're quite happy to list the amount of ice in it at https://sites.google.com/site/arcticseaicegraphs/regional

perhaps something like a labeled version of the following?

I've been wanting/planning to do this for ages, but somehow never did. I'll make a labelled map and add it to the Regional Graphs page. Thanks for reminding me, Andy.

[Wipneus]

For my work on regional area and extent I needed a name for ice that is not in those 14 well-known regions. Instead of lumping them as  "other", I defined a few more regions (inspired by NSIDC's MASIE).

Extra regions are:

pacf: Open Pacific Ocean     
japn: Japanese/Yellow Sea       
alsk: Gulf of Alaska             
atln: Open Atlantic Ocean     
main: Gulf of Maine             
balt: Baltic Sea                 
lake: Lakes

The lakes should have been defined anyway as a separate domain anyway, IMO.

[Neven]

I've been wanting/planning to do this for ages, but somehow never did. I'll make a labelled map and add it to the Regional Graphs page. Thanks for reminding me, Andy.

Map is added to the Regional Graphs page:

[iamlsd]

Yah this map is great - I finally know where and what people are talking about - at least a little better anyway. Thanks very much

[oren]

And add to that the acronyms that had me baffled in the beginning:
ESS = East Siberian Sea
CAA = Canadaian Archipelago
CAB = Central Arctic basin

[Neven]

And add to that the acronyms that had me baffled in the beginning:
ESS = East Siberian Sea
CAA = Canadaian Archipelago
CAB = Central Arctic basin

I've added CAB. The other two were already in there.

[Tor Bejnar]

CAA is the Canadian Arctic Archipelago, for those interested in the detail.

And add to that the acronyms that had me baffled in the beginning:
ESS = East Siberian Sea
CAA = Canadaian Archipelago
CAB = Central Arctic basin

[Flocke]

FJL - Franz Josef Land
WLA - ? (http://forum.arctic-sea-ice.net/index.php/topic,1493.msg73948.html#msg73948)

[Neven]

FJL - Franz Josef Land
WLA - ? (http://forum.arctic-sea-ice.net/index.php/topic,1493.msg73948.html#msg73948)

Does anyone use FJL as an acronym? I've added it to the glossary nonetheless. Yes, and I saw that WLA too and had no idea what it meant. 

[Andreas T]

Kann es sein dass Plinius vergessen hat dass hier nicht deutsch gesprochen wird? WLA koennte WarmLuftAdvection  heissen.

my guess is that WLA is the german for Warm Air Advection

[Neven]

Das wäre schon möglich, Andreas!

From the context I figured he meant something along those lines.

[oren]

CAA is the Canadian Arctic Archipelago, for those interested in the detail.

And add to that the acronyms that had me baffled in the beginning:
ESS = East Siberian Sea
CAA = Canadaian Archipelago
CAB = Central Arctic basin

Yeah sorry, thanks for the correction.

[etienne]

Hello,

Could you also explain what is the lower line in the JAXA AMSR2 Artic Sea Ice Melt and total extend made by Wipneus ?
Thanks,

Etienne

[Neven]

Hi Etienne,

The answer is in the Home brew AMSR2 thread, and in my latest blog post on the ASIB. Basically it's a graphical display of the blue and grey on those JAXA maps that show where the surface is melting.

Cheers,

Neven

[Tor Bejnar]

Sea Ice Glossary
by C. A. Linder and associated with a 2003 expedition to the far South.

Defines about 30 types of sea ice and related terms, but doesn't include melange!

[Jim Hunt]

Weather forecasting models

GFS - Global Forecast System

ECMWF (AKA Euro) - European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts

UKMO - United Kingdom Meteorological Office

NAVGEM -  Navy Global Environmental Model

See the sidebar at MeteoCiel for a few more!