Enhancing international collaborations for the retrieval of sea ice floe size distribution (FSD) from satellite SAR imagery
Lead Research Organisation:
Scottish Association For Marine Science
Department Name: Dunstaffnage Marine Laboratory
Abstract
Rapid decline in Arctic sea ice has been observed, and climate models predict even more dramatic changes in the near future. One of the key components that cause such rapid sea ice reduction is sea-ice floe (pieces) breakup in the margin of the ice area during spring and summer. At the edge of sea-ice area, sea-ice floes are exposed to waves and winds and break into smaller pieces. As they become smaller, they become easier to melt from the side and exposing more open water areas. More exposed open water areas then leads to warmer ocean as more sunlight absorb into the ocean, which in turn make sea ice more fragile and breakable. This process can accelerate sea ice retreat in summer and thus impact the minimum ice extent.
To understand the effects of such process on summer sea ice retreat, reliable information on sea-ice floe size distribution (FSD) is necessary. Such observations can be made from satellite Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) that can observe sea ice through cloud and darkness. There is an increasing number of satellite SAR images being acquired in the Arctic, and often at spatial resolutions in the images as good as 1-20 m. More importantly satellite SAR images are being acquired over autonomous buoy systems and in conjunction with field campaigns. This provides the ideal framework to measure the full range of ocean, sea-ice and atmosphere parameters to investigate complex floe breakup process.
However the challenge we have is a lack of proven-quality algorithms that can derive FSD from satellite SAR images fast and accurately. Thresholding algorithms previously applied to the problem are not adequate for quantitative analysis and the performance has not been precisely assessed. Recently NERC TPoC funded us to conduct research to develop cutting-edge algorithm for the retrieval of sea-ice FSD from SAR images.
In this IOP proposal we expand our current project internationally in order to add values to the current NERC TPoC project as well as have impacts on wide research communities and commercial companies.
To understand the effects of such process on summer sea ice retreat, reliable information on sea-ice floe size distribution (FSD) is necessary. Such observations can be made from satellite Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) that can observe sea ice through cloud and darkness. There is an increasing number of satellite SAR images being acquired in the Arctic, and often at spatial resolutions in the images as good as 1-20 m. More importantly satellite SAR images are being acquired over autonomous buoy systems and in conjunction with field campaigns. This provides the ideal framework to measure the full range of ocean, sea-ice and atmosphere parameters to investigate complex floe breakup process.
However the challenge we have is a lack of proven-quality algorithms that can derive FSD from satellite SAR images fast and accurately. Thresholding algorithms previously applied to the problem are not adequate for quantitative analysis and the performance has not been precisely assessed. Recently NERC TPoC funded us to conduct research to develop cutting-edge algorithm for the retrieval of sea-ice FSD from SAR images.
In this IOP proposal we expand our current project internationally in order to add values to the current NERC TPoC project as well as have impacts on wide research communities and commercial companies.
Planned Impact
- Formation of cohesive research and user group. The major impact of this IOP project is to form a focused research group that has common interested in FSD retrieval algorithm (image processing) as well as the use of retrieved data (sea ice observations and modeling, and commercial companies). In this proposal we propose the workshop that involve wide-range of research areas including image processing, sea ice modelling and commercial companies. The workshop provides opportunity to identify and address any sea-ice FSD related issues, and will be the stepping stone to develop a research/user consortium in the future.
- Case study. While the proposed workshop take a holistic approach, the case study will have direct impacts on adding values on current NERC project. We carefully selected four key partners in image processing and remote sensing and one key partner in sea ice FSD modelling. These key partners will be directly involved in the case study that improve image processing algorithm and conduct inter-comparison and validation of the model outputs. This will have significant impacts on improvement of efficiency and accuracy of the sea-ice FSD retrieval algorithm, and also improve sea-ice FSD model parameterisations.
- Case study. While the proposed workshop take a holistic approach, the case study will have direct impacts on adding values on current NERC project. We carefully selected four key partners in image processing and remote sensing and one key partner in sea ice FSD modelling. These key partners will be directly involved in the case study that improve image processing algorithm and conduct inter-comparison and validation of the model outputs. This will have significant impacts on improvement of efficiency and accuracy of the sea-ice FSD retrieval algorithm, and also improve sea-ice FSD model parameterisations.
Organisations
- Scottish Association For Marine Science (Lead Research Organisation)
- Korea Polar Research Institute (Collaboration)
- German Aerospace Centre (DLR) (Collaboration)
- UNIVERSITY OF STRATHCLYDE (Collaboration)
- European Centre for Medium Range Weather Forecasting ECMWF (Collaboration)
- Superior Technology School (Collaboration)
- NATIONAL OCEANOGRAPHY CENTRE (Collaboration)
- Dartmouth College (Collaboration)
- Brown University (Collaboration)
- Nansen Environmental Research Centre (India) (Collaboration)
- University of Gdansk (Collaboration)
- Gebze Technical University (Collaboration)
- University of Washington (Collaboration)
- Nansen Env and Remote Sensing Ctr (Project Partner)
- Grenoble Institute of Technology (Project Partner)
- UNSW Sydney (Project Partner)
- Okan University (Project Partner)
- National Institute of Informatics (Project Partner)
Publications
Chai Y
(2021)
Texture-Sensitive Superpixeling and Adaptive Thresholding for Effective Segmentation of Sea Ice Floes in High-Resolution Optical Images
in IEEE Journal of Selected Topics in Applied Earth Observations and Remote Sensing
Gallaher S
(2016)
Evolution of a Canada Basin ice-ocean boundary layer and mixed layer across a developing thermodynamically forced marginal ice zone
in Journal of Geophysical Research: Oceans
Hwang B
(2017)
A practical algorithm for the retrieval of floe size distribution of Arctic sea ice from high-resolution satellite Synthetic Aperture Radar imagery
in Elementa: Science of the Anthropocene
Hwang B
(2017)
Winter-to-summer transition of Arctic sea ice breakup and floe size distribution in the Beaufort Sea
in Elementa: Science of the Anthropocene
Lee C
(2017)
An Autonomous Approach to Observing the Seasonal Ice Zone in the Western Arctic
in Oceanography
Park J
(2016)
Radar backscattering changes in Arctic sea ice from late summer to early autumn observed by space-borne X-band HH-polarization SAR
in Remote Sensing Letters
Stern H
(2018)
Seasonal evolution of the sea-ice floe size distribution in the Beaufort and Chukchi seas
in Elementa: Science of the Anthropocene
Zhang J
(2016)
Modeling the seasonal evolution of the Arctic sea ice floe size distribution
in Elementa: Science of the Anthropocene
Description | This grant provided a unique opportunity to establish collaborations with the scientists and engineers in various fields: image processing, machine learning, sea ice and ocean physics, which resulted in co-authored journal publications that highlight the importance of seasonal feedback of sea ice floes. In the Arctic, sea ice undergoes a continuous freeze-up, breakup and melt cycle. For example, in autumn sea ice and open water freeze to form a continuous sheet of winter ice, and the winter ice deforms and breaks apart into small pieces of ice (called floes) in spring and melt away in summer. The collaborative studies, funded by this grant, allowed us to examine this important seasonal cycle through developing computer algorithms to derive sea ice floe size distribution from satellite imagery. |
Exploitation Route | Our findings have been published in high-impact open-access journals, so that relevant researchers and publics can access the information. |
Sectors | Environment |
Description | NERC Standard grants |
Amount | £311,966 (GBP) |
Funding ID | NE/R000654/1 |
Organisation | Natural Environment Research Council |
Sector | Public |
Country | United Kingdom |
Start | 09/2017 |
End | 03/2020 |
Title | FSD data to UK Polar Data Centre |
Description | This data set generated from the algorithm developed through two NERC grants received. The data set contains sea-ice floe size distribution data derived from USGS GFL high-resolution imagery (see below for the title of data set and the data centre stored). The data set is under embargo until March 2021. Hwang, B. (2020). Sea-ice floe size distribution data derived from USGS GFL high-resolution satellite imagery for the pre-ponding period of 2000-2014 [Data set]. UK Polar Data Centre, Natural Environment Research Council, UK Research & Innovation. https://doi.org/10.5285/FCA1C981-98DC-4F4F-BBDF-822062DF87AC |
Type Of Material | Database/Collection of data |
Year Produced | 2019 |
Provided To Others? | No |
Impact | This data set is unique, containing sea-ice floe size distribution over 10 years at three different locations across the Arctic. |
Title | Texture-sensitive superpixeling and adaptive thresholding for effective segmentation of sea ice floes in high-resolution optical images |
Description | A computer algorithm has been developed to improve the retrieval of sea ice floe size from satellite imagery. This algorithm uses texture-sensitive superpixeling and adaptive thresholding to achieve a more effective segmentation of sea ice floes in satellite imagery. |
Type Of Material | Computer model/algorithm |
Year Produced | 2021 |
Provided To Others? | Yes |
Impact | This new method can improve the efficacy of sea ice floe segmentation. This will provide us with a more accurate estimation of sea ice floe size distribution from satellite imagery, which will inform sea ice modelling scientists for the validation or calibration of their models. |
URL | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/9271815 |
Description | Collaboration with Brown University |
Organisation | Brown University |
Country | United States |
Sector | Academic/University |
PI Contribution | Our research team contributed Dr Horvat's research by providing observational data set to his modelling studies. |
Collaborator Contribution | Dr Horvat contributed to journal publication. Dr Horvat is a project partner of our NERC MOSAiC project. |
Impact | The collaboration leads to a joint conference presentation. Wang, Y., Bateson, A., Hwang, B., Aksenov, Y., Horvat, C. (2020) Model-observation comparison of sea ice floe size distribution in the Arctic. AGU Fall Meeting, 2020. |
Start Year | 2015 |
Description | Collaboration with DLR |
Organisation | German Aerospace Centre (DLR) |
Department | DLR Munich |
Country | Germany |
Sector | Public |
PI Contribution | The NERC project contributed Drs Lehner and Rosenthal the opportunity to join the inter-disciplinary workshop (called FSD workshop, directly funded by NE/M00600X/1). |
Collaborator Contribution | Drs Lehner and Rosenthal contributed to the collaborative workshop by providing the presentation on high-resolution satellite SAR works and participating group discussions regarding future collaborative research involving modelling and observations of sea ice. |
Impact | The collaborative workshop (called FSD workshop, held on July 6-7, 2015 at the Scottish Association for Marine Science). |
Start Year | 2015 |
Description | Collaboration with Dartmouth College |
Organisation | Dartmouth College |
Country | United States |
Sector | Academic/University |
PI Contribution | The NERC project contributed Drs Song and Polashenski and Ms. Arntsen (PhD student) to join the inter-disciplinary workshop (called FSD workshop, directly funded by NE/M00600X/1). |
Collaborator Contribution | Dr. Song, Dr. Polashenski and Ms. Arntsen contributed to the collaborative workshop by providing the presentation on their recent works of high-resolution optical data, and participating group discussions regarding future collaborative research involving modelling and observations of sea ice. Prof Perovich and Ms. Arntsen contributed to a co-authored paper published in 2017. |
Impact | The collaborative workshop (called FSD workshop, held on July 6-7, 2015 at the Scottish Association for Marine Science). The collaboration resulted in a co-authored paper. Still collaborating with Prof. Perovich, and recently developed an NERC proposal with him. Prof. Perovich is also ta Steering Committee member of MOSAiC program. |
Start Year | 2015 |
Description | Collaboration with ECMWF |
Organisation | European Centre for Medium Range Weather Forecasting ECMWF |
Country | United Kingdom |
Sector | Public |
PI Contribution | The NERC project contributed Dr. Bidlot to join the inter-disciplinary workshop (called FSD workshop, directly funded by NE/M00600X/1). |
Collaborator Contribution | Dr. Bidlot contributed to the collaborative workshop by providing the presentation on his wave-sea ice modelling works and participating group discussions regarding future collaborative research involving modelling and observations of sea ice. |
Impact | The collaborative workshop (called FSD workshop, held on July 6-7, 2015 at the Scottish Association for Marine Science). |
Start Year | 2015 |
Description | Collaboration with ETS |
Organisation | Superior Technology School |
Country | Canada |
Sector | Academic/University |
PI Contribution | Through the NERC project (NE/M00600X/1) I was able to visit Dr. Ben Ayed to discuss about future project to apply advanced optimization algorithms to sea ice feature extraction problems. |
Collaborator Contribution | During the visit Dr. Ben Ayed contributed to the discussion regarding the latest development of optimization algorithms which can be applied to specifically sea ice feature extraction. He contributed to a co-authored paper published in 2017. |
Impact | As a results of discussion, the collaborative proposal was formulated and successfully submitted to US Office of Naval Research (the funding decision is still pending). The collaboration resulted in a co-authored publication. |
Start Year | 2014 |
Description | Collaboration with Gebze Technical University |
Organisation | Gebze Technical University |
Department | Institute of Information Technologies |
Country | Turkey |
Sector | Academic/University |
PI Contribution | My NERC project enabled me to establish the collaboration with Dr. Erhan at Okan University, Turkey. During the visit in Turkey (supported by NE/M00600X/1), I provided significant domain knowledge on sea ice physics and satellite data so that Dr. Erhan can formulate optimized image processing tools to process sea ice remote sensing data. We invited Dr. Erhan to the UK to discuss sea ice image analysis. |
Collaborator Contribution | Dr. Erhan spent his time to formulate and apply various image processing algorithms (such as region-based classification and deep learning) to derive melt ponds and other sea ice features. He contributed to a co-authored paper published in 2017. |
Impact | An informal report has been produced between myself and Dr. Erhan. The collaboration resulted in a co-authored publication. |
Start Year | 2014 |
Description | Collaboration with NERSC |
Organisation | Nansen Environmental Research Centre (India) |
Country | India |
Sector | Academic/University |
PI Contribution | The NERC project (NE/M00600X/1) contributed Dr. Williams to provide opportunity to coordinate and participate the collaborative workshop (directly funded by NE/M00600X/1). The workshop provided very unique opportunity for modelling, observational and image processing scientists/engineers to get together and share their knowledge/experience. |
Collaborator Contribution | Dr. Williams contributed the NERC project (NE/M00600X/1) through co-coordinating the workshop and led modelling section in the workshop. He also contributed to writing minutes from the workshop. |
Impact | The collaborative workshop (called FSD workshop, held on July 6-7, 2015 at the Scottish Association for Marine Science). |
Start Year | 2015 |
Description | Collaboration with NOC |
Organisation | National Oceanography Centre |
Country | United Kingdom |
Sector | Academic/University |
PI Contribution | The NERC project contributed Drs Aksenov and Hosekova to join the inter-disciplinary workshop (called FSD workshop, directly funded by NE/M00600X/1). |
Collaborator Contribution | Drs Aksenov and Hosekova contributed to the collaborative workshop by providing the presentation on their sea ice floe size modelling works and participating group discussions regarding future collaborative research involving modelling and observations of sea ice. |
Impact | The collaborative workshop (called FSD workshop, held on July 6-7, 2015 at the Scottish Association for Marine Science). The collaboration leads to a joint conference presentation. Dr Aksenov is the external advisor of PhD student Yanan Wang at the University of Huddersfield, and a co-author of the manuscript submitted to The Cryosphere. |
Start Year | 2015 |
Description | Collaboration with PSC at UW |
Organisation | University of Washington |
Country | United States |
Sector | Academic/University |
PI Contribution | The NERC funded projects (NE/L012707/1) allowed us to develop state-of-the-art algorithm to derive sea ice floe size distribution (FSD) from high-resolution satellite synthetic aperture radar (SAR) data. Some of the derived FSD data have been contributed to collaborative research with Dr. Zhang at PSC/UW. We provided sea ice FSD (ranging between 200 m to 2 km) that significantly contributed to calibration of the recently developed numerical sea ice FSD model. Dr Zhang is now a project partner in the NERC MOSAiC project (NE/S0025454/1). |
Collaborator Contribution | Dr. Zhang contributed my NERC projects by providing detailed comparison between satellite-derived sea ice FSD and model-simulated FSD. This type of studies have not been attempted before. Some results of this collaborative partnership contributed to one co-authored manuscript submitted to Elementa. Dr Zhang has contributed to the NERC MOSAiC project (NE/S0025454/1 ) by proving his expertise on numerical modelling. |
Impact | The collaboration resulted in a co-authored paper published in 2016 and another paper in review, as well as a NERC proposal in 2018. |
Start Year | 2014 |
Description | Collaboration with U of Gdansk |
Organisation | University of Gdansk |
Country | Poland |
Sector | Academic/University |
PI Contribution | The NERC project contributed Dr. Herman to join the inter-disciplinary workshop (called FSD workshop, directly funded by NE/M00600X/1). |
Collaborator Contribution | Dr. Herman contributed to the collaborative workshop by providing the presentation on floe-scale sea ice modelling works and participating group discussions regarding future collaborative research involving modelling and observations of sea ice. |
Impact | The collaborative workshop (called FSD workshop, held on July 6-7, 2015 at the Scottish Association for Marine Science). |
Start Year | 2015 |
Description | Collaboration with U of Strathclyde |
Organisation | University of Strathclyde |
Country | United Kingdom |
Sector | Academic/University |
PI Contribution | The NERC project contributed Drs Ren, Marshall and Murray to join the inter-disciplinary workshop (called FSD workshop, directly funded by NE/M00600X/1). |
Collaborator Contribution | Dr. Ren (Co-I of the NERC project) contributed to the coordination of the workshop. Dr Ren contributed to two co-authored papers published in 2017. Drs Marshall and Murray contributed to the collaborative workshop by providing the presentation on their image processing works and participating group discussions regarding future collaborative research involving image processing and observations of sea ice. |
Impact | The collaborative workshop (called FSD workshop, held on July 6-7, 2015 at the Scottish Association for Marine Science). The collaboration resulted in two co-authored papers in 2017, and one NERC proposal (Dr Ren as CoI) in 2018. |
Start Year | 2015 |
Description | Collaboration with the KOPRI |
Organisation | Korea Polar Research Institute |
Country | Korea, Republic of |
Sector | Public |
PI Contribution | Our research team used the Kompsat SAR images to identify floe characteristics at the MOSAiC site. |
Collaborator Contribution | The KOPRI provided Kompsat SAR images at the MOSAiC site. |
Impact | KOPRI provides logistics support to access KOPRI icebreaker ship to Arctic fieldworks. Some of those fieldwork data supported the development of FSD algorithm. However, the Kompsat SAR images are part of multiple satellite imagery data that we combine to derive the floe size distribution and identify floe characterisation, in which the publication we are currently working on. |
Start Year | 2015 |
Description | Guest speaker at SOLAS Workshop on Remote Sensing for Studying the Ocean-Atmosphere Interface |
Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
Results and Impact | I was invited as a guest speaker at the SOLAS (Surface Ocean Lower Atmosphere Study) Workshop on Remote Sensing for Studying the Ocean-Atmosphere Interface, USA. In this talk, I introduced my research on Marginal Ice Zone (MIZ) from the algorithm development to process studies. This talk raised the importance of MIZ process related research and discussions and led to future related activity within SOLAS community: forming a discussion session on MIZ process at the SOLAS Open Science Conference to be held in Japan in April 2019. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2012,2018 |
URL | https://www.confmanager.com/main.cfm?cid=2778&nid=16562 |
Description | Invited talk at the Beijing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Beijing, China |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | Regional |
Primary Audience | Postgraduate students |
Results and Impact | Invited talk at the Beijing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics. We shared our findings with Chinese professors and postgradudate students, and discussed about future collobrations. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2017 |
Description | Talk at the Isaac Newton Institute for Mathematical Sciences, University of Cambridge, UK |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
Results and Impact | The workshop was organised by international leading scientists in sea ice modelling and observation. More than 50 scientists were attended at the workshop. This provided an opportunity to introduce our findings and enhance further collaborations. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2017 |
URL | https://www.newton.ac.uk/event/sipw01 |