The Coldest Place in the World   
       
   Dec. 10, 2013:  What is the coldest place on Earth? It is a high ridge in   
   Antarctica on the East Antarctic Plateau where temperatures in several hollows   
   can dip below minus 133.6 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 92 degrees Celsius) on a   
   clear winter night.   
       
   Scientists made the discovery while analyzing the most detailed global surface   
   temperature maps to date, developed with data from remote sensing satellites   
   including the new Landsat 8, a joint project of NASA and the U.S. Geological   
   Survey (USGS). Ted Scambos, lead scientist at the National Snow and Ice Data   
   Center in Boulder, Colo., joined a team of researchers reporting the findings   
   Monday at the American Geophysical Union meeting in San Francisco.   
       
   http://www.nasa.gov/sites/default/files/coldestplacerecords.png   
       
   With remote-sensing satellites, scientists have found the coldest places on   
   Earth, just off a ridge in the East Antarctic Plateau. The coldest of the cold   
   temperatures dropped to minus 135.8 F (minus 93.2 C) -- several degrees colder   
   than the previous record. Image Credit: Ted Scambos, National Snow and Ice   
   Data Center   
   Researchers analyzed 32 years' worth of data from several satellite   
   instruments. They found temperatures plummeted to record lows dozens of times   
   in clusters of pockets near a high ridge between Dome Argus and Dome Fuji, two   
   summits on the ice sheet known as the East Antarctic Plateau. The new record   
   of minus 136 F (minus 93.2 C) was set Aug. 10, 2010.   
       
   That is several degrees colder than the previous low of minus 128.6 F (minus   
   89.2 C), set in 1983 at the Russian Vostok Research Station in East   
   Antarctica. The coldest permanently inhabited place on Earth is northeastern   
   Siberia, where temperatures in the towns of Verkhoyansk and Oimekon dropped to   
   a bone-chilling 90 degrees below zero Fahrenheit (minus 67.8 C) in 1892 and   
   1933, respectively.   
       
   "We had a suspicion this Antarctic ridge was likely to be extremely cold, and   
   colder than Vostok because it's higher up the hill," Scambos said. "With the   
   launch of Landsat 8, we finally had a sensor capable of really investigating   
   this area in more detail."   
       
   The quest to find out just how cold it can get on Earth -- and why -- started   
   when the researchers were studying large snow dunes, sculpted and polished by   
   the wind, on the East Antarctic Plateau. When the scientists looked closer,   
   they noticed cracks in the snow surface between the dunes, possibly created   
   when wintertime temperatures got so low the top snow layer shrunk. This led   
   scientists to wonder what the temperature range was, and prompted them to hunt   
   for the coldest places using data from two types of satellite sensors.   
       
   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hp6wMUVb23c   
       
   The coldest place on earth is in the East Antarctic Plateau, but not at the   
   highest peak. Rather, the coldest spots develop just downhill from a ridge   
   that runs from Dome A to Dome Fuji.   
       
   They turned to the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS)   
   instruments on NASA's Terra and Aqua satellites and the Advanced Very High   
   Resolution Radiometer (AVHRR) on several National Oceanic and Atmospheric   
   Administration satellites. These sensitive instruments can pick up thermal   
   radiation emitted from Earth's surface, even in areas lacking much heat.   
       
   Using these sensors to scan the East Antarctic Plateau, Scambos detected   
   extremely cold temperatures on a 620-mile stretch of the ridge at high   
   elevations between Argus and Fuji, and even colder temperatures lower   
   elevations in pockets off the ridge. Then, with the higher resolution of the   
   Thermal Infrared Sensor (TIRS) aboard Landsat 8, the research team pinpointed   
   the record-setting pockets.   
       
   The team compared the sites to topographic maps to explore how it gets so   
   cold. Already cold temperatures fall rapidly when the sky clears. If clear   
   skies persist for a few days, the ground chills as it radiates its remaining   
   heat into space. This creates a layer of super-chilled air above the surface   
   of the snow and ice. This layer of air is denser than the relatively warmer   
   air above it, which causes it to slide down the shallow slope of domes on the   
   Antarctic plateau. As it flows into the pockets, it can be trapped, and the   
   cooling continues.   
       
   "By causing the air to be stationary for extended periods, while continuing to   
   radiate more heat away into space, you get the absolute lowest temperatures   
   we're able to find," Scambos said. "We suspected that we would be looking for   
   one magical site that got extremely cold, but what we found was a large strip   
   of Antarctica at high altitude that regularly reached these record low   
   temperatures."   
       
   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jlucyyHVXes   
       
   This narrated animation shows the process by which the coldest place on Earth   
   develops its extreme low temperatures.  Play it   
       
   The study is an example of some of the intriguing science possible with   
   Landsat 8 and the TIRS instrument, which was built at NASA's Goddard Space   
   Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md. Since its launch Feb. 11, Landsat 8 has   
   captured approximately 550 scenes per day of Earth's land surface. USGS   
   processes, archives and distributes the images free of charge over the   
   Internet.   
       
   "With Landsat 8, we expect to see more accurate and more detailed maps of the   
   landscape than we've ever been able to see," said James Irons, the mission's   
   project scientist at Goddard. "If change is occurring, I think we'll be able   
   to detect it earlier and track it."   
       
   Researchers also are eager to see what new results come out of Landsat 8, both   
   from icy plateaus and Earth's warmer regions.   
       
   "What we've got orbiting Earth right now is a very accurate and consistent   
   sensor that can tell us all kinds of things about how the land surface of   
   Earth is changing, how climate change is impacting the surface of Earth, the   
   oceans of Earth, and the icy areas of Earth," Scambos said. "Finding the   
   coldest areas on Earth is just the beginning of the discoveries we're going to   
   be able to make with Landsat 8."   
       
   Credits:   
   Production editor: Dr. Tony Phillips | Credit: Science@NASA   
       
   More information:   
       
   NASA's Landsat 8 website:   
       
   http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/landsat/main/index.html   
       
       
   Regards,   
       
   Roger   
      
   --- D'Bridge 3.96   
    * Origin: NCS BBS - Houma, LoUiSiAna (1:3828/7)