{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2026,1,24]],"date-time":"2026-01-24T19:45:55Z","timestamp":1769283955613,"version":"3.49.0"},"reference-count":45,"publisher":"MDPI AG","issue":"1","license":[{"start":{"date-parts":[[2015,12,22]],"date-time":"2015-12-22T00:00:00Z","timestamp":1450742400000},"content-version":"vor","delay-in-days":0,"URL":"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/4.0\/"}],"funder":[{"name":"German Ministry for Education and Research (BMBF)","award":["03G0833D"],"award-info":[{"award-number":["03G0833D"]}]}],"content-domain":{"domain":[],"crossmark-restriction":false},"short-container-title":["Remote Sensing"],"abstract":"<jats:p>The presence of sea-ice leads represents a key feature of the Arctic sea ice cover. Leads promote the flux of sensible and latent heat from the ocean to the cold winter atmosphere and are thereby crucial for air-sea-ice-ocean interactions. We here apply a binary segmentation procedure to identify leads from MODIS thermal infrared imagery on a daily time scale. The method separates identified leads into two uncertainty categories, with the high uncertainty being attributed to artifacts that arise from warm signatures of unrecognized clouds. Based on the obtained lead detections, we compute quasi-daily pan-Arctic lead maps for the months of January to April, 2003\u20132015. Our results highlight the marginal ice zone in the Fram Strait and Barents Sea as the primary region for lead activity. The spatial distribution of the average pan-Arctic lead frequencies reveals, moreover, distinct patterns of predominant fracture zones in the Beaufort Sea and along the shelf-breaks, mainly in the Siberian sector of the Arctic Ocean as well as the well-known polynya and fast-ice locations. Additionally, a substantial inter-annual variability of lead occurrences in the Arctic is indicated.<\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.3390\/rs8010004","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2015,12,23]],"date-time":"2015-12-23T06:52:19Z","timestamp":1450853539000},"page":"4","update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.3390\/mdpi_crossmark_policy","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":76,"title":["Sea-Ice Wintertime Lead Frequencies and Regional Characteristics in the Arctic, 2003\u20132015"],"prefix":"10.3390","volume":"8","author":[{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0002-2710-0699","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Sascha","family":"Willmes","sequence":"first","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Environmental Meteorology, University of Trier, Trier 54296, Germany"}]},{"given":"G\u00fcnther","family":"Heinemann","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Environmental Meteorology, University of Trier, Trier 54296, Germany"}]}],"member":"1968","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2015,12,22]]},"reference":[{"key":"ref_1","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"7971","DOI":"10.1029\/JC087iC10p07971","article-title":"Large-scale heat exchange and ice production","volume":"87","author":"Maykut","year":"1982","journal-title":"J. Geophys. Res. Oceans"},{"key":"ref_2","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"192","DOI":"10.3189\/172756411795931543","article-title":"Solar partitioning in a changing Arctic sea-ice cover","volume":"52","author":"Perovich","year":"2011","journal-title":"Ann. Glaciol."},{"key":"ref_3","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"318","DOI":"10.1038\/ngeo1452","article-title":"Atmospheric observations of Arctic Ocean methane emissions up to 82\u00b0 north","volume":"5","author":"Kort","year":"2012","journal-title":"Nat. Geosci."},{"key":"ref_4","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"2408","DOI":"10.1002\/jgrc.20191","article-title":"Arctic sea ice circulation and drift speed: Decadal trends and ocean currents","volume":"118","author":"Kwok","year":"2013","journal-title":"J. Geophys. Res. Oceans"},{"key":"ref_5","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Hutchings, J.K., and Hibler, W.D. (2008). Small-scale sea ice deformation in the Beaufort Sea seasonal ice zone. J. Geophys. Res. Oceans, 113.","DOI":"10.1029\/2006JC003971"},{"key":"ref_6","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"9","DOI":"10.1016\/S0924-7963(96)00054-1","article-title":"The importance of polynyas, ice edges, and leads to marine mammals and birds","volume":"10","author":"Stirling","year":"1997","journal-title":"J. Mar. Syst."},{"key":"ref_7","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"20140159","DOI":"10.1098\/rsta.2014.0159","article-title":"Arctic sea ice trends, variability and implications for seasonal ice forecasting","volume":"373","author":"Serreze","year":"2015","journal-title":"Philos. Trans. R. Soc. A"},{"key":"ref_8","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"1175","DOI":"10.1007\/s10712-014-9284-0","article-title":"Effects of Arctic sea ice decline on weather and climate: A review","volume":"35","author":"Vihma","year":"2014","journal-title":"Surv. Geophys."},{"key":"ref_9","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"1005","DOI":"10.1007\/s10584-011-0101-1","article-title":"The Arctic\u2019s rapidly shrinking sea ice cover: A research synthesis","volume":"110","author":"Stroeve","year":"2012","journal-title":"Clim. Chang\u00e3\u0102\u0106"},{"key":"ref_10","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"2719","DOI":"10.1007\/s00382-012-1505-y","article-title":"Arctic climate change in 21st century CMIP5 simulations with EC-Earth","volume":"40","author":"Koenigk","year":"2013","journal-title":"Clim. Dyn."},{"key":"ref_11","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"114","DOI":"10.1016\/j.ocemod.2008.10.009","article-title":"Ocean circulation and sea ice distribution in a finite element global sea ice\u2013ocean model","volume":"27","author":"Timmermann","year":"2009","journal-title":"Ocean Model."},{"key":"ref_12","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"L\u00fcpkes, C., Vihma, T., Birnbaum, G., and Wacker, U. (2008). Influence of leads in sea ice on the temperature of the atmospheric boundary layer during polar night. Geophys. Res. Lett., 35.","DOI":"10.1029\/2007GL032461"},{"key":"ref_13","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"143","DOI":"10.5194\/tc-6-143-2012","article-title":"Influence of sea ice lead-width distribution on turbulent heat transfer between the ocean and the atmosphere","volume":"6","author":"Marcq","year":"2012","journal-title":"Cryosphere"},{"key":"ref_14","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Barber, D.G., Hop, H., Mundy, C.J., Else, B., Dmitrenko, I.A., Tremblay, J.E., Ehn, J.K., Assmy, P., Daase, M., and Candlish, L.M. (2015). Selected physical, biological and biogeochemical implications of a rapidly changing Arctic Marginal Ice Zone. Prog. Oceanogr., in press.","DOI":"10.1016\/j.pocean.2015.09.003"},{"key":"ref_15","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"789","DOI":"10.1029\/JC095iC01p00789","article-title":"Opening and closing of sea ice leads: Digital measurements from synthetic aperture radar","volume":"95","author":"Fily","year":"1990","journal-title":"J. Geophys. Res. Oceans"},{"key":"ref_16","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"227","DOI":"10.3189\/S026030550001288X","article-title":"The detectability of sea-ice leads in satellite data as a function of atmospheric conditions and measurement scale","volume":"17","author":"Key","year":"1993","journal-title":"Ann. Glaciol."},{"key":"ref_17","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"4533","DOI":"10.1029\/94JC02393","article-title":"Arctic sea ice leads from advanced very high resolution radiometer images","volume":"100","author":"Lindsay","year":"1995","journal-title":"J. Geophys. Res. Oceans"},{"key":"ref_18","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Dr\u00fce, C., and Heinemann, G. (2004). High-resolution maps of the sea-ice concentration from MODIS satellite data. Geophys. Res. Lett., 31.","DOI":"10.1029\/2004GL020808"},{"key":"ref_19","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"139","DOI":"10.1016\/j.rse.2004.12.004","article-title":"Accuracy assessment of sea-ice concentrations from MODIS using in-situ measurements","volume":"95","author":"Heinemann","year":"2005","journal-title":"Remote. Sens. Environ."},{"key":"ref_20","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"21723","DOI":"10.1029\/98JC01997","article-title":"A 5-year satellite climatology of winter sea ice leads in the western Arctic","volume":"103","author":"Miles","year":"1998","journal-title":"J. Geophys. Res. Oceans"},{"key":"ref_21","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Tarabalka, Y., Brucker, L., Ivanoff, A., and Tilton, J.C. (2012, January 22\u201327). Shape-constrained segmentation approach for Arctic multiyear sea ice floe analysis. Proceedings of the IEEE International Geoscience and Remote Sensing Symposium (IGARSS), Munich, Germany.","DOI":"10.1109\/IGARSS.2012.6352499"},{"key":"ref_22","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"38","DOI":"10.1109\/TGRS.2012.2202666","article-title":"A sea-ice lead detection algorithm for use with high-resolution airborne visible imagery","volume":"51","author":"Onana","year":"2013","journal-title":"IEEE Trans. Geosci. Remote Sens."},{"key":"ref_23","unstructured":"Mahoney, A., Eicken, H., Shapiro, L., Gens, R., Heinrichs, T., Meyer, F., and Gaylord, A. (2012). Mapping and Characterization of Recurring Spring Leads and Landfast Ice in the Beaufort and Chukchi Seas, University Fairbanks. Final Report; Ocs Study Boem 2012-067."},{"key":"ref_24","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"1955","DOI":"10.5194\/tc-9-1955-2015","article-title":"Lead detection in Arctic sea ice from CryoSat-2: Quality assessment, lead area fraction and width distribution","volume":"9","author":"Wernecke","year":"2015","journal-title":"Cryosphere"},{"key":"ref_25","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Zakharova, E.A., Fleury, S., Guerreiro, K., Willmes, S., R\u00e9my, F., Kouraev, A.V., and Heinemann, G. (2015). Sea ice leads detection using SARAL\/AltiKa altimeter. Mar. Geod., 38.","DOI":"10.1080\/01490419.2015.1019655"},{"key":"ref_26","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"343","DOI":"10.5194\/tc-6-343-2012","article-title":"An algorithm to detect sea ice leads by using AMSR-E passive microwave imagery","volume":"6","author":"Kaleschke","year":"2012","journal-title":"Cryosphere"},{"key":"ref_27","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"1451","DOI":"10.3390\/rs6021451","article-title":"A nine-year climatology of Arctic sea ice lead orientation and frequency from AMSR-E","volume":"6","author":"Kaleschke","year":"2014","journal-title":"Remote Sens."},{"key":"ref_28","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"29","DOI":"10.3189\/2015AoG69A615","article-title":"Pan-Arctic lead detection from MODIS thermal infrared imagery","volume":"56","author":"Willmes","year":"2015","journal-title":"Ann. Glaciol."},{"key":"ref_29","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Spreen, G., Kwok, R., and Menemenlis, D. (2011). Trends in Arctic sea ice drift and role of wind forcing: 1992\u20132009. Geophys. Res. Lett., 38.","DOI":"10.1029\/2011GL048970"},{"key":"ref_30","unstructured":"Riggs, G.A., Hall, D.K., and Salomonson, V.V. (2006). MODIS Sea Ice Products User Guide to Collection 5, National Snow and Ice Data Center, University of Colorado. Technical Report."},{"key":"ref_31","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"966","DOI":"10.1175\/JAMC-D-14-0175.1","article-title":"Uncertainties of temperature measurements on snow-covered land and sea ice from in situ and MODIS data during BROMEX","volume":"54","author":"Hall","year":"2015","journal-title":"J. Appl. Meteorol. Clim."},{"key":"ref_32","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"1057","DOI":"10.1175\/2008JTECHA1052.1","article-title":"Cloud detection with MODIS. Part I: Improvements in the MODIS cloud mask for collection 5","volume":"25","author":"Frey","year":"2008","journal-title":"J. Atmos. Ocean. Technol."},{"key":"ref_33","unstructured":"Ackerman, S., Frey, R., Strabala, K., Liu, Y., Gumley, L., Baum, B., and Menzel, P. (2010). Discriminating Clear-Sky from Cloud with MODIS Algorithm Theoretical Basis Document (MOD35), Technical Report for MODIS Cloud Mask Team, Cooperative Institute for Meteorological Satellite Studies, University of Wisconsin. Version 6.1."},{"key":"ref_34","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"181","DOI":"10.1016\/j.rse.2004.06.004","article-title":"Nighttime polar cloud detection with MODIS","volume":"92","author":"Liu","year":"2004","journal-title":"Remote Sens. Environ."},{"key":"ref_35","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Liu, Y., and Key, J.R. (2014). Less winter cloud aids summer 2013 Arctic sea ice return from 2012 minimum. Environ. Res. Lett., 9.","DOI":"10.1088\/1748-9326\/9\/4\/044002"},{"key":"ref_36","unstructured":"Vermote, E., Kotchenova, S., and Ray, J. (2011). MODIS Surface Reflectance Users Guide. Version 1.3, MODIS Land Surface Reflectance Science Computing Facility."},{"key":"ref_37","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"1","DOI":"10.1016\/S0422-9894(06)74001-6","article-title":"The role of sea ice in Arctic and Antarctic polynyas","volume":"Volume 74","author":"Barber","year":"2007","journal-title":"Polynyas, Windows to the World"},{"key":"ref_38","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"151","DOI":"10.3189\/172756411795931633","article-title":"Multi-satellite sensor analysis of fast-ice development in the Norske \u00d8er Ice Barrier, northeast Greenland","volume":"52","author":"Hughes","year":"2011","journal-title":"Ann. Glaciol."},{"key":"ref_39","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"4925","DOI":"10.1002\/2014JC010635","article-title":"Kara Sea freshwater transport through Vilkitsky Strait: Variability, forcing, and further pathways toward the western Arctic Ocean from a model and observations","volume":"120","author":"Janout","year":"2015","journal-title":"J. Geophys. Res. Oceans"},{"key":"ref_40","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Pinto, J.O., Alam, A., Maslanik, J., Curry, J., and Stone, R.S. (2003). Surface characteristics and atmospheric footprint of springtime Arctic leads at SHEBA. J. Geophys. Res. Oceans, 108.","DOI":"10.1029\/2000JC000473"},{"key":"ref_41","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"153","DOI":"10.5194\/tc-7-153-2013","article-title":"The impact of heterogeneous surface temperatures on the 2-m air temperature over the Arctic Ocean under clear skies in spring","volume":"7","author":"Tetzlaff","year":"2013","journal-title":"Cryosphere"},{"key":"ref_42","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"C02S03","DOI":"10.1029\/2005JC003384","article-title":"Sea ice remote sensing using AMSR-E 89-GHz channels","volume":"113","author":"Spreen","year":"2008","journal-title":"J. Geophys. Res. Oceans"},{"key":"ref_43","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"275","DOI":"10.5194\/tc-8-275-2014","article-title":"Atmosphere\u2014Ice forcing in the transpolar drift stream: Results from the DAMOCLES ice-buoy campaigns 2007\u20132009","volume":"8","author":"Haller","year":"2014","journal-title":"Cryosphere"},{"key":"ref_44","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Aksenov, Y., Ivanov, V., Nurser, A., Bacon, S., Polyakov, I., Coward, A., Naveira-Garabato, A., and Beszczynska-Moeller, A. (2011). The Arctic circumpolar boundary current. J. Geophys. Res. Oceans, 116.","DOI":"10.1029\/2010JC006637"},{"key":"ref_45","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"6669","DOI":"10.1002\/2014JC010310","article-title":"The effects of tides on the water mass mixing and sea ice in the Arctic Ocean","volume":"120","author":"Luneva","year":"2015","journal-title":"J. Geophys. Res. Oceans"}],"container-title":["Remote Sensing"],"original-title":[],"language":"en","link":[{"URL":"https:\/\/www.mdpi.com\/2072-4292\/8\/1\/4\/pdf","content-type":"unspecified","content-version":"vor","intended-application":"similarity-checking"}],"deposited":{"date-parts":[[2025,10,11]],"date-time":"2025-10-11T20:54:32Z","timestamp":1760216072000},"score":1,"resource":{"primary":{"URL":"https:\/\/www.mdpi.com\/2072-4292\/8\/1\/4"}},"subtitle":[],"short-title":[],"issued":{"date-parts":[[2015,12,22]]},"references-count":45,"journal-issue":{"issue":"1","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2016,1]]}},"alternative-id":["rs8010004"],"URL":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.3390\/rs8010004","relation":{},"ISSN":["2072-4292"],"issn-type":[{"value":"2072-4292","type":"electronic"}],"subject":[],"published":{"date-parts":[[2015,12,22]]}}}