2017 ESIP Winter Meeting

This Workshop continues the theme of similar sessions at two previous ESIP meetings on CRT (Climate Resilience Toolkit) and ongoing work that could form the bases for CRT Case Studies.

Workshop agenda:

- [5 min] Introduction to the workshop, logistics, larger goal to establish a CRT pipeline at the ESIP level, etc.

- [10 min] Introduction to CRT (~2-3 slides); 5-minute Ken Burns video on story telling

- Brief description of work related to agriculture that forms the basis for a potential CRT Case Study

[15 minj] --- Ying Sun, Cornell University, Drought onset mechanisms revealed by solar-induced chlorophyll fluorescence (SIF): Insights from two contrasting extreme events

The droughts of 2011 in Texas and 2012 over the central Great Plains were used as case studies, to explore the potential of satellite-observed solar-induced chlorophyll fluorescence (SIF) for monitoring drought dynamics. For both drought events, the spatial patterns of negative SIF anomalies from the Global Ozone Monitoring Instrument 2 (GOME-2) closely resembled drought intensity maps from the U.S. Drought Monitor. In the Texas event, the drought-induced suppression of SIF occurred throughout 2011 but was exacerbated during the summer. This event was characterized by a persistent depletion of root-zone soil moisture caused by year-long below-normal precipitation. In contrast, in the central Great Plains event, warmer temperatures and relatively normal precipitation boosted SIF in the spring of 2012. However, a sudden drop in precipitation coupled with unusually high temperatures rapidly depleted soil moisture through evapotranspiration, leading to a rapid onset of drought in early summer. As a result, SIF reversed from above to below normal. For both event regions, the GOME-2 SIF anomalies were significantly correlated with those of root-zone soil moisture, indicating that the former could potentially be used as a proxy for the latter, for monitoring agricultural droughts with different onset mechanisms. Further analyses indicated that the contrasting dynamics of SIF during these two extreme events were caused by changes in both the fraction of absorbed photosynthetically active radiation (fPAR) and fluorescence yield, suggesting that satellite SIF is sensitive to both structural and physiological/biochemical variations of vegetation. We conclude that the emerging satellite SIF has excellent potential for dynamic drought monitoring.

[15 min] --- John Bolten, Associate Program Manager of Water Resources for the NASA Applied Sciences Program [TBD title]
[TBD abstract] 

[40 min] - Two concurrent breakout groups, one for each of the presenters and led by them. The groups discuss and draft the incipient stories that would become CRT Case Studies, using the CRT "templates."

[5 min] - The groups recombine and share results and thoughts.