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Trends of Thermal, Wetness, and Vegetative Change in the Circumpolar Arctic

Published by ORNL_DAAC | National Aeronautics and Space Administration | Catalog Last Checked: June 16, 2026 at 08:46 PM | Dataset Last Updated: June 16, 2026
This dataset provides estimates of trends in temperature, moisture, and vegetation changes over the circumpolar Arctic. Time series trends were measured by the Theil-Sen slope and associated p-values for a variety of variables including 2-meter air temperature, precipitation, soil moisture, non-frozen season days, permafrost active layer thickness, snow cover, vapor pressure deficit, land surface water fraction, normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI), and vegetation optical depth. Trends were measured annually and over specific seasons of spring (March to May), summer (June to August), autumn (September to November) and winter (December to February), and for the 1980-2020 and 1997-2020 time periods, depending on the variable and original data availability. Emerging hotspots of change were identified for the same variables and seasons, but only over the 1997-2020 period. In addition, a multivariate ranking was used to create combined hotspot layers to show areas of substantial changes in the thermal environment, moisture, and vegetation; these themes reflect landscape changes considered to be detrimental (e.g., a threat) to ecosystems and human populations. Ancillary files provide the boundaries of study regions, Brown permafrost regions, and a land cover product. The data are provided in cloud optimized GeoTIFF (COG) and shapefile formats.

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earth-science-atmospheric-ocean-indicators-climate-indicators-precipitation-indicators earth-science-atmospheric-temperature-atmosphere-surface-temperature earth-science-atmospheric-water-vapor-atmosphere-water-vapor-indicators earth-science-cryospheric-indicators-climate-indicators earth-science-frozen-ground-land-surface-active-layer earth-science-frozen-ground-land-surface-seasonally-frozen-ground earth-science-land-surface-agriculture-indicators-climate-indicators-soil-moisture earth-science-land-surface-agriculture-indicators-climate-indicators-vegetation-cover

Complete Metadata
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description This dataset provides estimates of trends in temperature, moisture, and vegetation changes over the circumpolar Arctic. Time series trends were measured by the Theil-Sen slope and associated p-values for a variety of variables including 2-meter air temperature, precipitation, soil moisture, non-frozen season days, permafrost active layer thickness, snow cover, vapor pressure deficit, land surface water fraction, normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI), and vegetation optical depth. Trends were measured annually and over specific seasons of spring (March to May), summer (June to August), autumn (September to November) and winter (December to February), and for the 1980-2020 and 1997-2020 time periods, depending on the variable and original data availability. Emerging hotspots of change were identified for the same variables and seasons, but only over the 1997-2020 period. In addition, a multivariate ranking was used to create combined hotspot layers to show areas of substantial changes in the thermal environment, moisture, and vegetation; these themes reflect landscape changes considered to be detrimental (e.g., a threat) to ecosystems and human populations. Ancillary files provide the boundaries of study regions, Brown permafrost regions, and a land cover product. The data are provided in cloud optimized GeoTIFF (COG) and shapefile formats.
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identifier 10.3334/ORNLDAAC/2322
keyword 
                                            [
  "earth-science-atmospheric-ocean-indicators-climate-indicators-precipitation-indicators",
  "earth-science-atmospheric-temperature-atmosphere-surface-temperature",
  "earth-science-atmospheric-water-vapor-atmosphere-water-vapor-indicators",
  "earth-science-cryospheric-indicators-climate-indicators",
  "earth-science-frozen-ground-land-surface-active-layer",
  "earth-science-frozen-ground-land-surface-seasonally-frozen-ground",
  "earth-science-land-surface-agriculture-indicators-climate-indicators-soil-moisture",
  "earth-science-land-surface-agriculture-indicators-climate-indicators-vegetation-cover",
  "earth-science-snow-ice-terrestrial-hydrosphere-snow-cover",
  "earth-science-surface-water-terrestrial-hydrosphere",
  "earth-science-vegetation-biosphere-vegetation-index",
  "earth-science-vegetation-biosphere-vegetation-optical-depth"
]
license https://www.usa.gov/government-works
modified 2026-06-16
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publisher 
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spatial 
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temporal 1980-01-01/2020-12-31
theme 
                                            [
  "Earth Science"
]
title Trends of Thermal, Wetness, and Vegetative Change in the Circumpolar Arctic

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