Some Lab News...

"Paint with all the colors of a glacier".  The Landsat 8 Satellite collects spectral information of the Earth's surface in 11 spectral bands, each spanning a different segment of the electromagnetic spectrum. The aim of conventional cameras is to capture the world as our eyes see  it, so they sense in the red, green, and blue wavelengths. Landsat can recreate the surface of the Earth to include to infrared wavelengths, which allow us to detect changes we cannot normally observe optically. In order to visualize these other wavelengths so our eyes can see them, we replace the Red, Green, or Blue channels in an image.

In this suite of images, different band combinations of Helheim glacier in Southwest Greenland are shown. Relative brightness and color in each of these images is due to the surfaces ability to reflect or absorb whatever wavelengths are included in each band composite. A true color or RGB image is located in the top left for comparison. 

All of this data is free and publicly available. Landsat 8 Band combinations in increasing order, starting in the top-left corner: 432, 546, 676, 675, 615, 576, 652, 564, 416