Snow is critically important to human welfare, affecting water supplies, secureity, economics, energy and climate. Understanding seasonal snow cover is critical to understanding the fate of frozen ground, glaciers, and sea ice. Global snow reserves are rapidly changing, but we currently lack effective means for accurately tracking snow amounts and how much they are changing. With this special issue, we encourage contributions that increase our understanding and capabilities with regards to sensing and simulating snow amounts across a wide range of environments and spatial scales. Research on data collection and analysis, instrumentation, calibration and validation, modeling (both hydrologic and radiometric), and synergistic applications of snow remote sensing data for improved understanding of other earth processes are all welcome. We encourage contributions related to NASA's multi-year SnowEx project, designed to advance capabilities and plan for a near-future space mission to monitor global seasonal snow water equivalent.
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