By: Alicia Delos and Nate TippeTeacher: Ms. Everett Southridge High SchoolGrade: 10th and 12th

Description of Images• Area of the world: The Antarctic Ocean• Dates used: October 1980- October 2010• Parameter depicted in image: Sea Surface

Temperature and the Ozone Hole

1996

1985

1990

1981

2000

2005

2010

(Ozone Hole)

1981

1985

1990

1995

2000

2005

2010

(Sea Surface Temperature)

• The ozone is a natural gas found in our atmosphere

• The "ozone layer" is a region in the stratosphere a few miles above earth's surface

• The ozone layer shields humans and other living things from harmful ultraviolet rays from the sun

• Human activity in the past several decades produce a chemical (chlorofluorocarbons) which is "killing" the ozone layer and making it shrink

• Ozone depletion occurs mostly in the poles• In the Antarctic, there is a huge ozone "hole“• With the increase of ozone harming chemicals,

the ozone holes can increase

• The ocean's most common elements are hydrogen, oxygen, sodium and chloride

• The earth has and still continues to go through climate changes

• Global warming has an effect on every living thing on earth

• Earth absorbs energy from the sun and then emits some of that energy back into space. This is called the "greenhouse effect"

• The greenhouse effect describes how water vapor, carbon dioxide and other gasses alter the return of energy into space therefore heating Earth's surface

• Question: Does the area of the ozone hole correlate with the area of the water that is below 0° C

• Hypothesis: The bigger the ozone hole is, the warmer the water in the Antarctic will be because the sun will have a more direct way of getting to the ocean causing it to warm up.

• Independent Variable:• Month: October• Years: 1980- 2010

• Dependent Variable: • The area of sea surface temperature below 0° C and the

area of the ozone hole

• Source of Images:• NASA NEO• NASA Earth Observatory World of Change

• Sources of Background Information: • NOAA

1. How to prepare the images for measurement:a. First you have to crop the image so that it is only the

area of the world that you want (in this case the Antarctic ocean). Next, you have to set the image so that instead of just one image it’s an RGB stack. After that you have to choose the “green” stack.

2. Set the scale to 3120 km per 289 pixels3. Set the threshold:

a. Set the threshold to include pixel values between 11 and 67 for sea surface temperature and 116 and 253 for the ozone hole

b. This will include the sea surface temperature below 0°C and the ozone hole size below 220 dobson units (the units used to measure the ozone)

4. Set measurements to area and limit to threshold then measure the image

Date Area of Sea Surface Temperature Below

0° C (km2)

Area of the Ozone Hole (km2)

Oct. 1981 228802502 17283560Oct. 1985 208297492 19842643Oct. 1990 213524156 23038053Oct. 1995 220452045 24720683Oct. 2000 212101589 24180584Oct. 2005 223792228 26168614Oct. 2010 156988578 26539278

The area of the Sea Surface Temperature VS the area of the Ozone Hole

0

50000000

100000000

150000000

200000000

250000000

1970 1980 1990 2000 2010 2020

Time (in years)

Are

a (

in k

m^

2)

Area of SST above 0 C

Area of the Ozone Hole

• The highest area of sea surface temperature occurred on Oct. 1981

• The lowest area of sea surface temperature occurred on Oct. 2010

• The highest area of the ozone hole occurred on Oct. 2010

• The lowest area of the ozone hole occurred on Oct. 1981

• Data Trend: • For the sea surface temperature, the water seemed to be

getting warmer with more time. With the ozone hole size, the hole seemed to be getting bigger with time.

• Unusual Findings:• There were some years where the water would not follow

the trend and would actually have a larger area with below 0° C water than the past years.

• Hypothesis: The bigger the ozone hole got, the warmer the water in the Antarctic Ocean was. Without the ozone, the suns ultraviolet rays will get further into the earth’s atmosphere causing the water to get warmer. Our hypothesis was supported by the data and we found that there was a negative correlation between the ozone hole size and the area with colder sea surface temperature. The “R” value for the negative correlation is -0.45.

• Future Prediction: The more that the ozone gets destroyed the warmer the earth is going to continue to get.

• 1. The pictures are flat and the earth is round. So some of the areas near the south pole may be larger or smaller than they actually are.

• 2. The program used to measure the area (Image J) closed down so the scale may be off in actual size.

• 3. For the ozone hole pictures, some of the ozone was less dense in areas we didn’t measure.

• 4. The area measurements were difficult to get after the Image J program shut down so they might not be exact.

• Humans need the ozone hole to protect them from the sun’s harmful UV rays. The ozone acts as a shield to living things on earth. Without the ozone, it would be very difficult for anything to survive. Humans would be getting severe skin cancer. The ozone provides a 80 - 95% protection. If the ozone were to be completely destroyed humans would have a major increase in sun burns and skin cancer.

• Plants cannot live and grow with heavy UV rays, and neither can plankton which would affect the ocean’s food chain. If fish started dying off from starvation, the Earth’s intricate food web would be ruined. Animals would have no plants to eat because those plants would be getting burned by the sun’s UV rays.

• Carlowicz, M. "The World We Avoided by Protecting the Ozone Layer." NASA’s Earth Observatory Website. 2009. Web. 14 May 2012. <http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Features/WorldOfChange/ozone.php>.

• Climate Prediction Center Internet T, . "Stratosphere: Southern Hemisphere Ozone Hole Size." National Weather Service. 29 Aug. 2005. Web. 14 May 2012.<http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/stratosphere/sbuv2to/ozone_hole.shtml>.

• http://www.noaa.gov/