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The Colorado Cryosphere Remote Sensing and Aquatic Biogeochemistry (CryoBioGeo-Sensing) research group employs novel multi-faceted approaches to investigate surface darkening of the global crysophere.  The cryosphere is Earth's mirror.  Snow is the most reflective surface on Earth.  However, the presence of light absorbing particles like black carbon , dust, and snow algae, increase energy absorption by snow and ice, which dissipates as heat, causing snow and ice to melt faster.  Each of these light absorbing constituents plays a role in the ice-albedo positive feedback loop.  However, their impacts vary in space and time. From field sites to satellites (with uncrewed aerial systems in between) we use cutting-edge field, laboratory, and optical remote sensing techniques to investigate questions like the spatial and temporal distribution of snow algae in Antarctica, the darkening of the bare-ice region of the Greenland Ice Sheet, and changes in snow and ice melt in high mountain regions such as the North Cascades, Rockies, Andes, and Himalayas.