Digital Data Storytelling

Overview

In summer of 2024, iHARP Senior Researcher and co-lead on Education and Outreach, Dr. Karen Chen organized a 6-week digital data storytelling internship in partnership with UMBC LLC faculty Dr. Sarah Jewett, with support from Montgomery College (MC) English faculty members Matthew Decker  and Jamie Gillan. Four (4) students from Montgomery College (two data science students and two digital storytelling students) were mentored by UMBC iHARP researchers Dr. Christopher Shuman and Dr. Sudip Chakraborty, along with Dr. Chen, Dr. Jewett and MC faculty members.

Digital Data Storytelling Showcase

“Antarctic Snow Darkening Synergy”, authored by MC digital data storytelling interns Kweku Agyepong and Thejitha Rajapakshe, mentored by iHARP researcher Dr. Sudip Chakraborty. In this video, the team presented a story that illustrates the possible relationship between Amazon wildfire and the melting ice in the Antarctic region using AI/Machine Learning methods. This story is based on Dr. Chakraborty and team’s work that use multiple years of satellite datasets to identify the melting patterns, onsets, and propagation of the sea ice melting due to the snow-darkening effects of black carbon aerosols that are transported from the Amazon wildfire regions by numerous aerosol atmospheric rivers, narrow and elongated channels of extreme particulate transport. This material is based upon work supported by the National Science Foundation under Grant No. 2302795 and 2118285. Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation.

“Big Bergs, Wandering Frozen Starts” authored by MC digital storytelling interns Cristina Romero-Romero and Davi De Almeida, mentored by iHARP researcher Dr. Christopher Shuman, tells the story of the evolution of “media star” iceberg A68A, tracing its journey from “birth” and “death”, along with a parallel story of the scientific discovery process related to the studies of ice-melting dynamics in polar regions with Dr. Shuman as the main character. This material is based upon work supported by the National Science Foundation under Grant No. 2302795 and 2118285. Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation.