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Axel Schweiger

Senior Principal Scientist

Email

axel@apl.washington.edu

Phone

206-543-1312

Research Interests

Remote Sensing, Arctic Climatology, Systems Management

Biosketch

Dr. Schweiger's research focuses on sea ice, clouds, and radiation in the Arctic. He is using satellite data, models, and in-situ observations to improve our understanding of sea ice and cloud variability. He has developed the PSC Arctic Ice Volume Page, which provides monthly updated total Arctic Ice Volume estimates based on the PIOMAS model. He has worked on the validation, improvements, and applications of PIOMAS to a variety of problems.

He is a an investigator in the Seasonal Ice Zone Reconnaissance Survey Project (SIZRS) that utilizes US-Coast Guard Arctic Domain Awareness flights make Atmospheric and Oceanographic measurements of the seasonal ice zone of the Beaufort Sea and targets the improved understanding of the changes in the Arctic system as sea ice retreats.

He has worked on algorithm development for the retrieval of clouds and atmospheric profiles and generated the the TOVS Polar Pathfinder data set, a 20-year data set of polar temperature, humidity profiles and cloud information. Previous research includes work on microwave-based sea ice concentration algorithms and the application of artificial intelligence methods to remote sensing problems. Dr. Schweiger has been with the Polar Science Center since 1992.

Department Affiliation

Polar Science Center

Education

B.A. Geography & English, Universitat Erlangen, 1984

M.S. Geography, University of Colorado, Boulder, 1987

Ph.D. Geography, University of Colorado, Boulder, 1992

Projects

Arctic Surface Air Temperatures for the Past 100 Years

Accurate fields of Arctic surface air temperature (SAT) are needed for climate studies, but a robust gridded data set of SAT of sufficient length is not available over the entire Arctic. We plan to produce authoritative SAT data sets covering the Arctic Ocean from 1901 to present, which will be used to better understand Arctic climate change.

 

The Fate of Summertime Arctic Ocean Heating: A Study of Ice-Albedo Feedback on Seasonal to Interannual Time Scales

The main objective of this study is to determine the fate of solar energy absorbed by the arctic seas during summer, with a specific focus on its impact on the sea ice pack. Investigators further seek to understand the fate of this heat during the winter and even beyond to the following summer. Their approach is use a coupled sea ice–ocean model forced by atmospheric reanalysis fields, with and without assimilation of satellite-derived ice and ocean variables. They are also using satellite-derived ocean color data to help determine light absorption in the upper ocean.

 

Videos

Arctic Sea Ice Extent and Volume Follow Long-term Trend

In mid-September Arctic sea ice reached its minimum extent and volume. There are annual fluctuations — 2012 was a record low for both measures — but reports of a recent 'rebound' are short-sighted. Axel Schweiger, Chair of the APL-UW Polar Science Center, shows that the downward long-term trend is clear.

6 Nov 2015

Arctic Sea Ice Extent and Volume Dip to New Lows

By mid-September, the sea ice extent in the Arctic reached the lowest level recorded since 1979 when satellite mapping began.

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15 Oct 2012

APL-UW polar oceanographers and climatologists are probing the complex ice–ocean–atmosphere system through in situ and remote sensing observations and numerical model simulations to learn how and why.

Focus on Arctic Sea Ice: Current and Future States of a Diminished Sea Ice Cover

APL-UW polar scientists are featured in the March edition of the UW TV news magazine UW|360, where they discuss their research on the current and future states of a diminished sea ice cover in the Arctic.

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7 Mar 2012

The dramatic melting of Arctic sea ice over the past several summers has generated great interest and concern in the scientific community and among the public. Here, APL-UW polar scientists present their research on the current state of Arctic sea ice. A long-term, downward trend in sea ice volume is clear.

They also describe how the many observations they gather are used to improve computer simulations of global climate that, in turn, help us to asses the impacts of a future state of diminished sea ice cover in the Arctic.

This movie presentation was first seen on the March 2012 edition of UW|360, the monthly University of Washington Television news magazine.

Publications

2000-present and while at APL-UW

Nudging observed winds in the Arctic to quantify associated sea ice loss from 1979 to 2020

Ding, Q., A. Schweiger, and I. Baxter, "Nudging observed winds in the Arctic to quantify associated sea ice loss from 1979 to 2020," J. Clim., 35, 3197-3213, doi:10.1175/JCLI-D-21-0893.1, 2022.

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15 Oct 2022

Over the past decades, Arctic climate has exhibited significant changes characterized by strong Pan-Arctic warming and a large scale wind shift trending toward an anticyclonic anomaly centered over Greenland and the Arctic ocean. Recent work has suggested that this wind change is able to warm the Arctic atmosphere and melt sea ice through dynamical-driven warming, moistening and ice drift effects. However, previous examination of this linkage lacks a capability to fully consider the complex nature of the sea ice response to the wind change. In this study, we perform a more rigorous test of this idea by using a coupled high-resolution modelling framework with observed winds nudged over the Arctic that allows for a comparison of these wind-induced effects with observations and simulated effects forced by anthropogenic forcing. Our nudging simulation can well capture observed variability of atmospheric temperature, sea ice and the radiation balance during the Arctic summer and appears to simulate around 30% of Arctic warming and sea ice melting over the whole period (1979–2020) and more than 50% over the period 2000 to 2012, which is the fastest Arctic warming decade in the satellite era. In particular, in the summer of 2020, a similar wind pattern reemerged to induce the second-lowest sea ice extent since 1979, suggesting that large scale wind changes in the Arctic is essential in shaping Arctic climate on interannual and interdecadal time scales and may be critical to determine Arctic climate variability in the coming decades.

Thick and old sea ice in the Beaufort Sea during summer 2020/21 was associated with enhanced transport

Moore, G.W.K., M. Steele, A.J. Schweiger, J.L. Zhang, and K.L. Laidre, "Thick and old sea ice in the Beaufort Sea during summer 2020/21 was associated with enhanced transport," Commun. Earth Environ., 3, doi:10.1038/s43247-022-00530-6, 2022.

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30 Aug 2022

The Arctic Ocean has seen a remarkable reduction in sea ice coverage, thickness and age since the 1980s. These changes are most pronounced in the Beaufort Sea, with a transition around 2007 from a regime dominated by multi-year sea ice to one with large expanses of open water during the summer. Using satellite-based observations of sea ice, an atmospheric reanalysis and a coupled ice-ocean model, we show that during the summers of 2020 and 2021, the Beaufort Sea hosted anomalously large concentrations of thick and old ice. We show that ice advection contributed to these anomalies, with 2020 dominated by eastward transport from the Chukchi Sea, and 2021 dominated by transport from the Last Ice Area to the north of Canada and Greenland. Since 2007, cool season (fall, winter, and spring) ice volume transport into the Beaufort Sea accounts for ~45% of the variability in early summer ice volume — a threefold increase from that associated with conditions prior to 2007. This variability is likely to impact marine infrastructure and ecosystems.

Recent upper Arctic Ocean warming expedited by summertime atmospheric processes

Li, Z., Q.H. Ding, M. Steele, and A. Schweiger, "Recent upper Arctic Ocean warming expedited by summertime atmospheric processes," Nat. Commun., 13, doi:10.1038/s41467-022-28047-8, 2022.

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18 Jan 2022

Low-frequency internal atmospheric variability accounts for about one quarter of observed Arctic Ocean warming over the past four decades and 60% of the accelerated warming from 2000 to 2018.

The observed upper (0–-50 m) Arctic Ocean warming since 1979 has been primarily attributed to anthropogenically driven changes in the high latitudes. Here, using both observational and modeling analyses, we demonstrate that a multiyear trend in the summertime large-scale atmospheric circulation, which we ascribe to internal variability, has played an important role in upper ocean warming in summer and fall over the past four decades due to sea ice-albedo effect induced by atmospheric dynamics. Nudging experiments in which the wind fields are constrained toward the observed state support this mechanism and suggest that the internal variability contribution to recent upper Arctic Ocean warming accounts for up to one quarter of warming over the past four decades and up to 60% of warming from 2000 to 2018. This suggests that climate models need to replicate this important internal process in order to realistically simulate Arctic Ocean temperature variability and trends.

More Publications

In The News

Fact check: NASA did not deny warming or say polar ice has increased since 1979

USA Today, Kate Petersen

NASA researchers have documented the loss of trillions of tons of ice from Earth's poles due to human-driven climate change. Citing published reports from the Polar Science Center and other sources, popular social media memes claiming an increase in polar ice since 1979 are swatted down.

21 Jan 2022

Arctic's 'last ice area' may be less resistant to global warming

The New York Times, Henry Fountain

The region, which could provide a last refuge for polar bears and other Arctic wildlife that depends on ice, is not as stable as previously thought, according to a new study.

1 Jul 2021

Arctic's 'last ice area' shows earlier-than-expected melt

Associated Press, Seth Borenstein

Part of the Arctic is nicknamed the 'Last Ice Area,' because floating sea ice there is usually so thick that it’s likely to withstand global warming for decades. So, scientists were shocked last summer when there was suddenly enough open water for a ship to pass through.

1 Jul 2021

More News Items

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