earth's atmosphere
it's the air we breathe the force that
regulates our temperature weather and
importantly what cleanses pollutants
from the environment
we've begun to realize that our
atmosphere has no geographical
boundaries when it comes to pollution
airborne industrial waste in one area
can litter forests thousands of miles
away with acid rain
due to our everyday activities a host of
gases such as carbon dioxide and methane
are being released into the atmosphere
of the watering rates
these greenhouse gases are known to trap
heat near the surface of the earth that
otherwise would radiate into space
potentially causing serious global
warming this problem has been studied by
scientists for many years
but never with the detail an airborne
observatory can make flying at all
levels of the atmosphere to do this us
and canadian scientists teamed up to
study greenhouse gases in the remote
northern latitudes of canada
the program called able for
atmospheric boundary layer experiment is
the third in a series of nasa-sponsored
research expedition
initiated in the early 80s abel will
eventually study major ecosystems around
the globe to better understand the
dynamics of our atmosphere
with the help of mcgill university a
ground-based site was chosen in northern
quebec that featured a forest and
wetlands environment
scientists from harvard and the state
university of new york built a 100 foot
tower at the forest site to sample
atmospheric chemistry and collect
meteorological data
meanwhile nasa biospherics researcher
gary whiting and assistant joel canez
spent countless hours at the nearby
wetlands measuring gases given off by
these grass-like sedges
detailed studies of the marsh plants
were also made by a group from the
university of delaware to characterize
their growth patterns and how they
transport methane gas into the
atmosphere
because of their hollow stems these
plants are very efficient transporters
of methane piping the gas directly into
the sky
many other measurements such as balloon
sawns track local winds temperatures and
humidity
an electric aircraft from nasa's wallops
flight facility virginia threw repeated
missions over the sites
seven experiments took air samples and
measured various chemical concentrations
dr ed browell of nasa's langley research
center used an instrument that shoots a
laser beam above and below the aircraft
to plot a cross-sectional view of the
atmosphere
the reddish-orange colors represent
regions containing higher concentrations
of ozone another greenhouse gas
studying atmospheric events from the sky
and the ground giving scientists an
unprecedented glimpse of the health of
our global environment