CryoSat-2 waveform classification for melt event monitoring

• Published in: Proceedings of the Northern Lights Deep Learning Workshop
• Main Authors: Vermeer, Martijn, Völgyes, David, McMillan, Malcolm, Fantin, Daniele
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: Septentrio Academic Publishing 2022
• Subjects: deep learning; surface mass balance; melt dynamics; Greenland; ice sheet; Cryosat-2; MODIS; glacier; Ice Sheet
• Online Access: https://septentrio.uit.no/index.php/nldl/article/view/6284; https://doi.org/10.7557/18.6284

Measuring the mass balance of ice sheets is important with respect to understanding among others sea level rise, glacier dynamics, global ocean circulation and marine ecosystems. One important parameter of the mass balance is surface melt, which can be estimated from different satellite data sources. In this study we investigate the potential of utilizing machine learning techniques for CryoSat-2 (CS2) radar altimeter waveform classification in order to derive melt information. Training data is derived by spatio-temporally matching of CS2 measurements with MODIS land surface temperature measurements. We propose a time convolution network with a fully connected classifier tail for CS2 waveform classifcation. In addition a non-deep learning model is implemented, providing a baseline. One of the main challenges is the high class imbalance, as surface temperatures on the interior of Greenland rarely reach the freezing point. The model performance is measured by several metrics: F1 score, average recall and Matthews correlation coefficient. The results of this proof of concept study indicate feasibility.