The salinity of Earth's oceans

In June of 2011, NASA launched a satellite named Aquarius, designed to monitor changes in the saltiness of the Earth's waters, rainfall and evaporation of Earth's waters, and climate and weather variations. Aquarius became operational in late August of 2011, and here is a map from its first two and a half weeks of data:

The red areas of the map have the highest surface salinity, and the purple areas the lowest.

By tracking changes in the salinity of the oceans, scientists will be better able to understand ocean currents and the movement of fresh water. For instance, the satellite captured images of the effects of tropical storm Lee as it hit Louisiana, causing the Mississippi River to discharge much more than it usually does, which led to a corresponding area of lowered salinity, pictured below.

 

The salinity of the area was only temporarily lowered, as can be seen in the middle image above. Read more about the data from this time period here: http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/catalog/pia15185

You can see the current location of the satellite here: http://aquarius.gsfc.nasa.gov/cgi/whereis_aquarius

To read more about the first map, go here: http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/aquarius/multimedia/gallery/pia14786.html

For more information about the Aquarius project, visit http://aquarius.nasa.gov/

NASA Tera Satellite

With the Mississippi overflowing action had to be taken causing the U.S Army Corp to open up gates to flood the Morganza Floodway. Thanks to NASA we can see the amount of water that has spread as a result of this. For more information on the Morganza Floodway or to view a larger image, go here.

Satellites need white balance too!

To take accurate images cameras need to be calibrated, and the same goes for satellites that are taking images of the earth to provide us with maps. Recently eight sites have been named as places that satellites can shoot at and use to calibrate their systems to accurately depict the globe as it is, ensuring greater consistency for scientists who are interpreting the data.

This image is of Lake Tuz in Turkey, which dries up in the summer leaving only this white salt behind. This has been named as one of the eight locations that can be used for calibration.

Snow!

With all the talk of a snowy beast of a storm coming across the states, and of course Michigan, it even has the natives in a tizzy!

While the nation is all abuzz over the blizzard warnings popping up everywhere NASA has taken the opportunity to show off, and have published this amazing shot of the storm moving across the US.

Will this mass of white bring us the foot plus of snow? We will find out tomorrow!

Global Climate Maps

Because many developing countries do not have the technology to study in depth the amount of air pollution affecting its citizens NASA has taken it upon themselves to make a global map showing areas of higher and lower density of pollution.

Our map library has many maps similar to this as well in our vast collection!