Ecological Research to be Helped by UV-Radiation Data

The effects of temperature and precipitation on the global distribution of plant and animal species are being studied by many research projects. However, an important component of climate research, the UV-B radiation, is often neglected. The landscape ecologists from UFZ in collaboration with their colleagues from the Universities in Olomouc (Czechia), Halle and Lüneburg have processed UV-B data from the U.S. NASA space agency in such a way that they can be used to study the influence of UV-B radiation on organisms. The basic input data were provided by a NASA satellite that regularly, since 2004, orbits the Earth at an altitude of 705 kilometres and takes daily measurements of the UV-B radiation.

"For us, however, not daily but the long-term radiation values are crucial, as these are relevant for organisms", says the UFZ researcher Michael Beckmann, the lead author of the study. The researchers therefore derived six variables from the UV-B radiation data. These include annual average, seasonality, as well as months and quarters with the highest or lowest radiation intensity. In order to process the enormous NASA data set, the UFZ researchers developed a computational algorithm, which not only removed missing or incorrect readings, but also summed up the daily measurements on a monthly basis and determined long-term averages. The processed data are currently available for the years 2004-2013 and will be updated annually.



Source-Eurekalert