The MODIS Sea Surface Temperature (SST) product provided is a 4km spatialresolution monthly composite made from nighttime measurements from the Aqua Satellite.The nighttime measurements are used to collect a consistent temperature measurement that isunaffected by the warming of the top layer of water by the sun.

Number of marine mammal species in Arctic marine regions classified by resident species (n = 11 total) or all species (including seasonal visitors, n = 35 total). CAFF 2013. Arctic Biodiversity Assessment. Status and Trends in Arctic biodiversity. Conservation of Arctic Flora and Fauna, Akureyri - Mammal (Chapter 3) page 84

The two species of murres, thick-billed Uria lomvia and common U. aalge, both have circumpolar distributions, breeding in Arctic, sub-Arctic and temperate seas from alifornia and N Spain to N Greenland, high Arctic Canada, Svalbard, Franz Josef Land and Novaya Zemlya (Box 4.3 Fig. 1). Conservation of Arctic Flora and Fauna, CAFF 2013 - Akureyri . Arctic Biodiversity Assessment. Status and Trends in Arctic biodiversity. - Birds(Chapter 4) page 163

Figure 4.1. Avian biodiversity in different regions of the Arctic. Charts on the inner circle show species numbers of different bird groups in the high Arctic, on the outer circle in the low Arctic. The size of the charts is scaled to the number of species in each region, which ranges from 32 (Svalbard) to 117 (low Arctic Alaska). CAFF 2013. Arctic Biodiversity Assessment. Status and Trends in Arctic biodiversity. Conservation of Arctic Flora and Fauna, Akureyri - Birds (Chapter 4) page 145

The MODIS Land Surface Temperature (LST) product provided is a monthlycomposite configured on a 0.05° Climate Model Grid (CMG). It includes both daytime andnighttime surface temperatures, taken at 11 um and 4 um (night). This product has beenscaled. To convert the raster values to a Kelvin temperature scale, multiply by a factor of 0.02.

The MODIS marine chlorophyll a product provided, similar to SST, is a 4 km global monthly composite based on smaller resolution daily imagery compiled by NASA. The imagery is reliant on clear ocean (free of clouds and ice) so only months from March to October have been provided, as the chlorophyll levels in the Arctic diminish during the winter months, when sea ice is prevalent. The marine chlorophyll a is measured in mg/m3

Arctic Biodiversity Assessment (ABA) 2013. Table 9.5. Species numbers of species-rich moss genera and families. Numbers highlighted in grey fields are used in calculating the percentage of the total moss flora. Listed are Splachnum, genera with at least 10 species and families with at least nine species. Conservation of Arctic Flora and Fauna, CAFF 2013 - Akureyri . Arctic Biodiversity Assessment. Status and Trends in Arctic biodiversity. - Plants(Chapter 9) page 333

The Arctic territory is roughly subdivided along two main axes in latitudinal subzones (Fig. 9.1) and longitudinal floristic provinces (Fig. 9.2). The latitudinal northsouth axis mainly reflects the present climate gradient divided into five different subzones, which are separated according to climate and vegetation in the lowlands of each zone. Published in the Arctic Biodiversity Assessment, Chapter 9 - released in 2013

The MODIS Land Cover Type product is created yearly using three landclassification schemes; the International Geosphere Biosphere Programme (IGBP)classification scheme, the Univertiy of Maryland (UMD) classification scheme, and aMODIS-derived Leaf Area Index /Fraction of Photosynthetically Active Radiation(LAI/fPAR) classification scheme (Table 3). The International Geosphere Biosphere Programme (IGBP) identifies seventeenland cover classes, including eleven natural vegetation classes, three non-vegetated landclasses, and three developed land classes. The product provided is derived using the samealgorithm as the 500 m Land Cover Type (MOD12Q1), but is on a 0.05° Climate Model Grid(CMG), that has been clipped to the pan-Arctic extent. The UMD classification scheme issimilar to the IGBP classification scheme, but it excludes the Permanent wetlands,Cropland/Natural vegetation mosaic, and the Snow and ice classes. The LAI/fPARclassification scheme is the smallest of the three, and focuses on forest structure; it only haseleven classes. All three land cover classification schemes are provided, but the IGBPclassification scheme is the most amenable to the Pan-Arctic region.