Aqua, Latin for water, is a NASA Earth Science satellite mission named for the large amount of information that the mission is collecting about the Earth's water cycle, including evaporation from the oceans, water vapor in the atmosphere, clouds, precipitation, soil moisture, sea ice, land ice, and snow cover on the land and ice. Additional variables also measured by Aqua include radiative energy fluxes, aerosols, vegetation cover on the land, phytoplankton and dissolved organic matter in the oceans, and air, land, and water temperatures. This brochure provides a comprehensive overview of the Aqua spacecraft, instruments, science, and data products.

The Aral Sea is actually not a sea at all, but an immense fresh water lake. In the last thirty years, more than sixty percent of the lake has disappeared because much of the river flow feeding the lake was diverted to irrigate cotton fields and rice paddies. Concentrations of salts and minerals began to rise in the shrinking body of water, leading to staggering alterations in the lakes ecology and precipitous drops in the Arals fish population. Powerful winds that blow across this part of Asia routinely pick up and deposit the now exposed lake bed soil. This has contributed to a significant reduction in breathable air quality, and crop yields have been appreciably affected due to heavily salt laden particles falling on arable land. This series of Landsat images taken in 1973, 1987 and 2000 show the profound reduction in overall area at the north end of the Aral, and a commensurate increase in land area as the floor of the sea now lies exposed.

This resource presents a brief overview the glaciation that created the Bering Land Bridge National Preserve. Links are provided to maps of the region, information about coastal geology, glaciers, volcanoes, mountains, and recommended reading.

This animation shows the daily sea ice surface temperature over the northern hemisphere from September 2002 through May 2003. The sea ice surface temperature was measured by the MODIS instrument on the Aqua satellite. Since this instrument cannot take measurements through clouds or in the dark, in dark or cloud-covered regions or areas with suspect data quality, the prior days value is retained until a valid data reading is obtained. The color of the sea ice indicates the sea ice surface temperature.

In this lesson, students will take their knowledge about the hydrosphere and apply it to the issue of population growth and development. In particular, students will learn how increasing development in eastern North Carolina may have worsened the effects of flooding from Hurricane Floyd, due to lack of soil and tree absorption of run-off. Students will create their own development plans for North Carolina in small groups, explaining how their plan will benefit North Carolina’s water resources and environment.

Dive and Discover brings you right aboard the expedition to the Juan de Fuca Ridge in the Pacific Ocean, where scientists are exploring hydrothermal vent fields and microbes inhabiting hydrothermal vents. The site gives you access to the latest oceanographic and deep submergence research from a variety of scientists including geologists, geophysicists, chemists, and biologists who are exploring the seafloor and making amazing deep-sea discoveries. The mission and objectives, daily updates, photos, videos, and e-mail correspondence with scientists aboard research vessels allow you to follow the progress of the scientific mission and find out about life on the floating laboratories at sea. Deeper discovery links allow the user to further explore the related topics of mid-ocean ridges, hydrothermal vents, and vent biology. This web page also provides links to other Dive and Discover expeditions, other deeper discovery topics, a teacher's page, and further Dive and Discover information.

Explore vent basics, vents around the world, vent chemistry, boiling points, videos, and test what you've learned with a quiz!

This lesson focuses upon the scientific phenomenon of El Nino. Learners will also explore the possible link between human-induced global warming, and El Nino as a possible distributor of global warming's extra energy. Links to related sites are included.

This site offers a window into the world of scientific research on climate change. Learn about physical processes underlying the earth's climate, data on how the climate is changing and the role of human activity, and questions and uncertainties that researchers continue to explore. The site is organized in four parts: the atmosphere, hydrosphere (oceans and water), cryosphere (snow and ice), and biosphere (living organisms).

This website is a cooperative research project between the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS), NASA, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, and the University of New Orleans. The goal of the project is to investigate coastal change that occurred as a result of Hurricane Katrina. The site includes aerial video, still photography, and laser altimetry surveys of post-storm beach conditions that were collected August 31 and September 1, 2005 for comparison with earlier data. The comparison data can be used to refine predictive models of coastal impacts from severe storms and aid in disaster recovery and erosion mitigation.

Since measurements of Jakobshavn Isbrae were first taken in 1850, the glacier has gradually receded, finally coming to rest at a certain point for the past 5 decades. However, from 1997 to 2003, the glacier has begun to recede again, this time almost doubling in speed. The finding is important for many reasons. For starters, as more ice moves from glaciers on land into the ocean, it raises sea levels. Jakobshavn Isbrae is Greenlands largest outlet glacier, draining 6.5 percent of Greenlands ice sheet area. The ice streams speed-up and near-doubling of ice flow from land into the ocean has increased the rate of sea level rise by about .06 millimeters (about .002 inches) per year, or roughly 4 percent of the 20th century rate of sea level increase. This animation shows a time-lapse sequence of the ice flowing toward the ocean. In recent years, even ice that has traditionally remained in place is now being pulled down to the edge of land.

Since measurements of Jakobshavn Isbrae were first taken in 1850, the glacier has gradually receded, finally coming to rest at a certain point for the past 5 decades. However, from 1997 to 2003, the glacier has begun to recede again, this time almost doubling in speed. The finding is important for many reasons. For starters, as more ice moves from glaciers on land into the ocean, it raises sea levels. Jakobshavn Isbrae is Greenlands largest outlet glacier, draining 6.5 percent of Greenlands ice sheet area. The ice streams speed-up and near-doubling of ice flow from land into the ocean has increased the rate of sea level rise by about .06 millimeters (about .002 inches) per year, or roughly 4 percent of the 20th century rate of sea level increase. This animation shows the recession for three years, from 2001 through 2003. The line of recession shows the place where the glacier meets the ocean and where pieces calve off and flow away from land toward open water.

The NeMO curriculum is based on real events and real data: the 1998 eruption at Axial Volcano and the rumbleometer instrument that was stuck in the new lava flow. The activities for the classroom are modeled on how scientists actually investigated this event. This curriculum is intended for middle and high school students in earth science and marine science classes. It is composed of four parts (which are each a separate file):

Part 1 - Introduction and Background Information
Part 2 - Classroom Activities
Part 3 - Movies and Animations
Part 4 - Key for Teachers (this part)

The Aqua Science Writers Guide provides a comprehensive overview of the Aqua mission, instruments, research, science teams, Aqua website, and public affairs contacts. All information is provided to aid the professional science writer in writing stories and articles related to the Aqua mission.

This animation shows the daily sea ice surface temperature over the northern hemisphere from September 2002 through May 2003. The sea ice surface temperature was measured by the MODIS instrument on the Aqua satellite. Since this instrument cannot take measurements through clouds, in cloud-covered regions or areas with suspect data quality, the prior days value is retained until a valid data reading is obtained. The satellite instruments are also unable to collect data in the dark, so the region around the pole is shown here with a grey cap that grows and shrinks, indicating the region in polar darkness. The color of the sea ice indicates the sea ice surface temperature.

The amount of snow covering the land has both short and long term effects on the environment. From season to season, snow coverage and depth affect soil moisture and water availability, which directly influence agriculture, wildfire occurrences, and drought. In the long term, the part of the Earths surface covered by snow reflects up to 80 or 90 percent of the incoming solar radiation as opposed to the 10 or 20 percent that uncovered land reflects, and this has important consequences for the Earths climate. Satellites identify the snow cover precisely by looking at the difference between light reflected off snow in the visible and the infrared wavelengths. This visualization shows the snow cover over North America from October, 2001, through April, 2002, as measured by the MODIS instrument on the Terra satellite. Since this instrument cannot measure snow cover through clouds, this visualization designates an area as covered by snow when the instrument takes a valid measurement showing greater than 50% snow coverage in that area. This area is assumed to be covered in snow until the instrument takes a valid measurement showing less than 40% coverage in that same area. In this animation, snow coverage is measured every 8 days.

In this STELLA modeling exercise, students create a model of heat flow in the outer kilometer of Earth's crust. Then they perform experiments to change the air temperature variable in an attempt to replicate the findings of Lachenbruch and Marshall (1986) who used inflections in the geothermal gradient of Alaskan permafrost to search for evidence of recent climatic change. Learning goals, context for use, teaching tips, materials, assessment tips and related resources are provided.

This 21-page pdf file is Book 4, Chapter A2 of a series of manuals on techniques and procedures for planning and executing specialized work in water-resources investigations. It describes procedures for preparing frequency curves from samples of hydrologic data. It also discusses the theory of frequency curves, compares advantages of graphical and mathematical fitting, suggests methods of describing graphically defined frequency curves analytically, and emphasizes the correct interpretations of a frequency curve. This can be used to teach distributions for matching to flood recurrence data.

This site provides background information about the relationship between ocean currents and surface winds. There are links to images, JPL missions and instruments, and an El Nino site.