This set of three videos illustrates how math is used in satellite data analysis. NASA climate scientist Claire Parkinson explains how the Arctic and Antarctic sea ice covers are measured from satellite data and how math is used to determine trends... (View More) in the data. In the first video, she leads viewers from satellite data collection through obtaining a time series of monthly Arctic and Antarctic average sea ice extents for November 1978-December 2016. In the second video, she begins with the time series from the first video, removes the seasonal cycle by calculating yearly averages, and proceeds to calculate the slopes of the lines to get trends in the data, revealing decreasing sea ice coverage in the Arctic and increasing sea ice coverage in the Antarctic. In the third video, she uses a more advanced technique to remove the seasonal cycle and shows that the trends are close to the same, whichever method is used. She emphasizes the power of math and that the techniques shown for satellite sea ice data can also be applied to a wide range of data sets. Note: See Related & Supplemental Resources for the maps and data files (1978-2016) that will allow you to do the calculations shown in the video. These also include data for different regions of the Arctic and Antarctic, enabling learners to do additional calculations beyond those shown in the videos. (View Less)

This short video (02:48) profiles Steve Nesbitt, a scientist affiliated with NASA's Global Precipitation Measurement (GPM) mission. Following a brief description of his career pathway, Nesbitt provides both an overview of the GPM mission as well as... (View More) insights into his work in validating and analyzing the GPM satellite data. (View Less)

This short video includes interviews with several key engineers who built and tested the Global Precipitation Measurement (GPM) Core Observatory at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center. Interviewees include: Beth Weinstein, GPM integration and test... (View More) engineer; Lisa Bartusek, GPM deputy mission systems engineer; and Carlton Peters, associate branch head at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center and GPM thermal branch development lead. (View Less)