[1] EGM2008 is a spherical harmonic model of the Earth's gravitational potential, developed by a least squares combination of the ITG-GRACE03S gravitational model and its associated error covariance matrix, with the gravitational information obtained from a global set of area-mean free-air gravity anomalies defined on a 5 arc-minute equiangular grid This grid was formed by merging terrestrial, altimetry-derived, and airborne gravity data Over areas where only lower resolution gravity data were available, their spectral content was supplemented with gravitational information implied by the topography EGM2008 is complete to degree and order 2159, and contains additional coefficients up to degree 2190 and order 2159 Over areas covered with high quality gravity data, the discrepancies between EGM2008 geoid undulations and independent GPS/Leveling values are on the order of ±5 to ±10 cm EGM2008 vertical deflections over USA and Australia are within ±11 to ±13 arc-seconds of independent astrogeodetic values These results indicate that EGM2008 performs comparably with contemporary detailed regional geoid models EGM2008 performs equally well with other GRACE-based gravitational models in orbit computations Over EGM96, EGM2008 represents improvement by a factor of six in resolution, and by factors of three to six in accuracy, depending on gravitational quantity and geographic area EGM2008 represents a milestone and a new paradigm in global gravity field modeling, by demonstrating for the first time ever, that given accurate and detailed gravimetric data, asingle global model may satisfy the requirements of a very wide range of applications

https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1029/2011JB008916

The development and evaluation of the Earth Gravitational Model 2008 (EGM2008)

We present Bedmap2, a new suite of gridded products describing surface elevation, ice-thickness and the seafloor and subglacial bed elevation of the Antarctic south of 60° S. We derived these products using data from a variety of sources, including many substantial surveys completed since the original Bedmap compilation (Bedmap1) in 2001. In particular, the Bedmap2 ice thickness grid is made from 25 million measurements, over two orders of magnitude more than were used in Bedmap1. In most parts of Antarctica the subglacial landscape is visible in much greater detail than was previously available and the improved data-coverage has in many areas revealed the full scale of mountain ranges, valleys, basins and troughs, only fragments of which were previously indicated in local surveys. The derived statistics for Bedmap2 show that the volume of ice contained in the Antarctic ice sheet (27 million km3) and its potential contribution to sea-level rise (58 m) are similar to those of Bedmap1, but the mean thickness of the ice sheet is 4.6% greater, the mean depth of the bed beneath the grounded ice sheet is 72 m lower and the area of ice sheet grounded on bed below sea level is increased by 10%. The Bedmap2 compilation highlights several areas beneath the ice sheet where the bed elevation is substantially lower than the deepest bed indicated by Bedmap1. These products, along with grids of data coverage and uncertainty, provide new opportunities for detailed modelling of the past and future evolution of the Antarctic ice sheets.

/pdf/bedmap2-improved-ice-bed-surface-and-thickness-datasets-for-23r3l5bd57.pdf

Bedmap2: improved ice bed, surface and thickness datasets for Antarctica

The Multi-GNSS Experiment (MGEX) of the International GNSS Service (IGS) - Achievements, prospects and challenges

The determination of the gravity model for the Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment (GRACE) is susceptible to modeling errors, measurement noise, and observability issues. The ill-posed GRACE estimation problem causes the unconstrained GRACE RL05 solutions to have north-south stripes. We discuss the development of global equal area mascon solutions to improve the GRACE gravity information for the study of Earth surface processes. These regularized mascon solutions are developed with a 1° resolution using Tikhonov regularization in a geodesic grid domain. These solutions are derived from GRACE information only, and no external model or data is used to inform the constraints. The regularization matrix is time variable and will not bias or attenuate future regional signals to some past statistics from GRACE or other models. The resulting Center for Space Research (CSR) mascon solutions have no stripe errors and capture all the signals observed by GRACE within the measurement noise level. The solutions are not tailored for specific applications and are global in nature. This study discusses the solution approach and compares the resulting solutions with postprocessed results from the RL05 spherical harmonic solutions and other global mascon solutions for studies of Arctic ice sheet processes, ocean bottom pressure variation, and land surface total water storage change. This suite of comparisons leads to the conclusion that the mascon solutions presented here are an enhanced representation of the RL05 GRACE solutions and provide accurate surface-based gridded information that can be used without further processing.

https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1002/2016JB013007

High-resolution CSR GRACE RL05 mascons

[1] Three approaches are used to reduce the error in the satellite-derived marine gravity anomalies. First, we have retracked the raw waveforms from the ERS-1 and Geosat/GM missions resulting in improvements in range precision of 40% and 27%, respectively. Second, we have used the recently published EGM2008 global gravity model as a reference field to provide a seamless gravity transition from land to ocean. Third, we have used a biharmonic spline interpolation method to construct residual vertical deflection grids. Comparisons between shipboard gravity and the global gravity grid show errors ranging from 2.0 mGal in the Gulf of Mexico to 4.0 mGal in areas with rugged seafloor topography. The largest errors of up to 20 mGal occur on the crests of narrow large seamounts. The global spreading ridges are well resolved and show variations in ridge axis morphology and segmentation with spreading rate. For rates less than about 60 mm/a the typical ridge segment is 50–80 km long while it increases dramatically at higher rates (100–1000 km). This transition spreading rate of 60 mm/a also marks the transition from axial valley to axial high. We speculate that a single mechanism controls both transitions; candidates include both lithospheric and asthenospheric processes.

/pdf/global-marine-gravity-from-retracked-geosat-and-ers-1-cc0qiwepyy.pdf

Global marine gravity from retracked Geosat and ERS‐1 altimetry: Ridge segmentation versus spreading rate

The recent improvements in the Gravity Recovery And Climate Experiment (GRACE) tracking data processing at GeoForschungsZentrum Potsdam (GFZ) and Groupe de Recherche de Geodesie Spatiale (GRGS) Toulouse, the availability of newer surface gravity data sets in the Arctic, Antarctica and North-America, and the availability of a new mean sea surface height model from altimetry processing at GFZ gave rise to the generation of two new global gravity field models. The first, EIGEN-GL04S1, a satellite-only model complete to degree and order 150 in terms of spherical harmonics, was derived by combination of the latest GFZ Potsdam GRACE-only (EIGEN-GRACE04S) and GRGS Toulouse GRACE/LAGEOS (EIGEN-GL04S) mean field solutions. The second, EIGEN-GL04S1 was combined with surface gravity data from altimetry over the oceans and gravimetry over the continents to derive a new high-resolution global gravity field model called EIGEN-GL04C. This model is complete to degree and order 360 and thus resolves geoid and gravity anomalies at half- wavelengths of 55 km at the equator. A degree-dependent combination method has been applied in order to preserve the high accuracy from the GRACE satellite data in the lower frequency band of the geopotential and to form a smooth transition to the high-frequency information coming from the surface data. Compared to pre-CHAMP global high-resolution models, the accuracy was improved at a spatial resolution of 200 km (half-wavelength) by one order of magnitude to 3 cm in terms of geoid heights. The accuracy of this model (i.e. the commission error) at its full spatial resolution is estimated to be 15 cm. The model shows a reduced artificial meridional striping and an increased correlation of EIGEN-GL04C-derived geostrophic meridional currents with World Ocean Atlas 2001 (WOA01) data. These improvements have led to select EIGEN-GL04C for JASON-1 satellite altimeter data reprocessing.

/pdf/the-geoforschungszentrum-potsdam-groupe-de-recherche-de-10aes7u7sp.pdf

The GeoForschungsZentrum Potsdam/Groupe de Recherche de Gèodésie Spatiale satellite-only and combined gravity field models: EIGEN-GL04S1 and EIGEN-GL04C

[1] Using three months of GPS satellite-to-satellite tracking and accelerometer data of the CHAMP satellite mission, a new long-wavelength global gravity field model, called EIGEN-1S, has been prepared in a joint German-French effort. The solution is derived solely from analysis of satellite orbit perturbations, i.e. independent of oceanic and continental surface gravity data. EIGEN-1S results in a geoid with an approximation error of about 20 cm in terms of 5 × 5 degree block mean values, which is an improvement of more than a factor of 2 compared to pre-CHAMP satellite-only gravity field models. This impressive progress is a result of CHAMP's tailored orbit characteristics and dedicated instrumentation, providing continuous tracking and direct on-orbit measurements of non-gravitational satellite accelerations.

https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1029/2002GL015064

A high‐quality global gravity field model from CHAMP GPS tracking data and accelerometry (EIGEN‐1S)

CNES (Centre National d’Etudes Spatiales) and CLS (Collecte Localisation Satellites) became an International GNSS Service (IGS) Analysis Center (AC) the 20th of May 2010. Since 2009, we are using the integer ambiguity fixing at the zero-difference level strategy in our software package (GINS/Dynamo) as an alternative to classical differential approaches. This method played a key role among all the improvements in the GPS processing we made during this period. This paper provides to the users the theoretical background, the strategies and the models used to compute the products (GPS orbits and clocks, weekly station coordinate estimates and Earth orientation parameters) that are submitted weekly to the IGS. The practical realization of the two-step, ambiguity-fixing scheme (wide-lane and narrow-lane) is described in detail. The ambiguity fixing improved our orbit overlaps from 6 to 3 cm WRMS in the tangential and normal directions. Since 2008, our products have been also regularly compared to the IGS final solutions by the IGS Analysis Center Coordinator. The joint effects of ambiguity fixing and dynamical model changes (satellite solar radiation pressure and albedo force) improved the consistency with IGS orbits from 35 to 18 mm 3D-WRMS. Our innovative strategy also gives additional powerful properties to the GPS satellite phase clock solutions. Single receiver (zero-difference) ambiguity resolution becomes possible. An overview of the applications is given.

Sylvain Loyer

Papers

The GeoForschungsZentrum Potsdam/Groupe de Recherche de Gèodésie Spatiale satellite-only and combined gravity field models: EIGEN-GL04S1 and EIGEN-GL04C

A high‐quality global gravity field model from CHAMP GPS tracking data and accelerometry (EIGEN‐1S)

Zero-difference GPS ambiguity resolution at CNES–CLS IGS Analysis Center

Temporal gravity field models inferred from GRACE data

The CHAMP-only earth gravity field model EIGEN-2