AVHRR Polar Pathfinder Twice-Daily 1.25 km EASE-Grid Composites  View Catalog Page Entry ID
NSIDC-0065
Summary
Please note that the machine on which these AVHRR data are processed has reached its life expectancy and will no longer be available as of 02 June 2008 until further notice.
The AVHRR Polar Pathfinder Twice-Daily 1.25 km EASE-Grid Composites are a collection of products for both poles, consisting of twice-daily gridded and calibrated satellite channel data and derived parameters. Data include five Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer (AVHRR) channels, clear sky surface broadband albedo and skin temperature, solar zenith angle, satellite elevation angle, sun-satellite relative azimuth angle, surface type mask, cloud mask, orbit mask, time of acquisition, and ice motion vectors. Data are composited onto two grids per day based on common local solar times and scan angle. Reduced-resolution data (25 km) derived from the 1.25 km data are available to assist users in selecting these data. AVHRR local area coverage (LAC) and High Resolution Picture Transmission (HRPT) level 1b data are used to generate the Polar Pathfinder products at grid spacings of 1.25 km. AVHRR Polar Pathfinder data extend poleward from 48.4 degrees north and 53.2 degrees south latitudes, from August 1993 through December 1998 for the Northern Hemisphere, and from April 1992 through January 1996 for the Southern Hemisphere. Data are in 1-byte and 2-byte integer grid format. Ice motion vectors are in ASCII text format. Data are available on 8-mm tape or by ftp. Distribution formats available: North: 104 MB (2-byte), 52 MB (1-byte), 8 MB (ice motion) South: 82 MB (2-byte), 41 MB (1-byte), 6.3 MB (ice motion).
Geographic Coverage
Spatial Coordinates:
N: -54°
S: -90°
E: 180°
W: -180°
N: 90°
S: 48°
E: 180°
W: -180°
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Data Set Citation
Dataset Creator: W. Emery, C. Fowler, T. Haran, J. Key, J. Maslanik, T. Scambos
Dataset Title: AVHRR Polar Pathfinder Twice-Daily 1.25 km EASE-Grid Composites
Dataset Release Date: 2000-12-01
Dataset Release Place: Boulder, CO U.S.A.
Dataset Publisher: National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC)
Online Resource: http://nsidc.org/data/nsidc-0065.html
Temporal Coverage
Start Date: 1992-04-01
Stop Date: 1998-12-31
Data Resolution
Temporal Resolution: Twice daily
Location Keywords
- Continent Antarctica
- Geographic Region Arctic
- Geographic Region Polar
Science Keywords
- Atmosphere Atmospheric Radiation Albedo
- Atmosphere Clouds Cloud Amount/Frequency
- Cryosphere Snow/Ice Albedo
- Land Surface Land Temperature Land Surface Temperature
- Land Surface Land Temperature Skin Temperature
- Land Surface Surface Radiative Properties Albedo
- Land Surface Surface Radiative Properties Thermal Properties
- Spectral/Engineering Infrared Wavelengths Brightness Temperature
- Spectral/Engineering Infrared Wavelengths Infrared Radiance
- Spectral/Engineering Infrared Wavelengths Thermal Infrared
- Spectral/Engineering Platform Characteristics Viewing Geometry
- Spectral/Engineering Visible Wavelengths Visible Radiance
- Terrestrial Hydrosphere Snow/Ice Albedo
Ancillary Keywords
- Antarctic
- Arctic
- AVHRR
- Cryosphere
- DAAC
- EOSDIS
- NASA
- NOAA
- NSIDC
- Pathfinder
- Polar
- Radiance
- Remote Sensing
- Satellite
Platform
- NOAA-11 National Oceanic & Atmospheric Administration-11
- NOAA-12 National Oceanic & Atmospheric Administration-12
- NOAA-14 National Oceanic & Atmospheric Administration-14
- NOAA-9 National Oceanic & Atmospheric Administration-9
Instrument
- AVHRR Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer
- RADIOMETERS
Project
- ESIP Earth Science Information Partners Program
- NOAA/NASA PATHFINDER NOAA/NASA Pathfinder Program
Quality
Channel data are accurate to within approximately +/- 0.2 percent based on sensor noise level of 0.4 data number (DN). Temperatures are accurate to within approximately 2 degrees Kelvin. Relative albedos in adjacent grid cells are accurate to within approximately 5 percent. However, absolute albedo values are approximate. Accuracies for the products are difficult to determine, given the limited nature of existing case studies. Also, conditions vary substantially across the large product domains and over time. Plans are being developed to further define product accuracies for snow-covered areas, sea ice, and ice sheets. Based on studies to date, accuracies in general are approximately +/- 2 degrees Kelvin for AVHRR-derived skin temperatures and +/- 0.05 degrees for surface albedo. Much of this error is likely due to uncertainties in the performance of the cloud detection methods. For clear sky conditions, accuracies for albedo and temperature products are expected to be in the range noted in the Barrow test, with temperatures accurate to +/- 0.5 degrees Celsius. Data and related information will be updated as appropriate. Additional comparisons with in situ measurements of albedo and temperature are planned. See also Maslanik et al. (2000) for other accuracy discussions relative to SHEBA data.
Data Set Progress
IN WORK
Data Center
National Snow and Ice Data Center
Data Center URL: http://nsidc.org
Data Set ID: NSIDC-0065
Data Center Personnel
Name: NSIDC User Services
Phone: +1 (303) 492-6199
Fax: +1 (303) 492-2468
Email: nsidc@nsidc.org
Contact Address:
National Snow and Ice Data Center
CIRES, 449 UCB
University of Colorado
City: Boulder
Province or State: CO
Postal Code: 80309-0449
Country: USA
NSIDC Distributed Active Archive Center
Data Center URL: http://nsidc.org/daac/index.html
Data Set ID: NSIDC-0065
Data Center Personnel
Name: NSIDC DAAC User Services
Phone: +1 (303) 492-6199
Fax: +1 (303) 492-2468
Email: nsidc@nsidc.org
Contact Address:
National Snow and Ice Data Center
CIRES, 449 UCB
University of Colorado
City: Boulder
Province or State: CO
Postal Code: 80309-0449
Country: USA
Distribution
Distribution Media: 8 mm tape, ftp
Distribution Size: varies. see Summary
Distribution Format: 1-byte and 2-byte integer grids. Ice motion data are in ASCII text format.
Personnel
NSIDC USER SERVICES
Role: TECHNICAL CONTACT
Phone: +1 (303) 492-6199
Fax: +1 (303) 492-2468
Email: nsidc@nsidc.org
Contact Address:
National Snow and Ice Data Center
CIRES, 449 UCB
University of Colorado
City: Boulder
Province or State: CO
Postal Code: 80309-0449
Country: USA
Jeffrey Key
Role: INVESTIGATOR
Contact Address:
Space Science and Engineering Center
University of Wisconsin at Madison
1225 W. Dayton St.
City: Madison
Province or State: WI
Postal Code: 53706
JIM MASLANIK
Role: INVESTIGATOR
Phone: (303) 492-6199
Fax: (303) 492-2468
Email: nsidc@kryos.colorado.edu
Contact Address:
National Snow and Ice Data Center
CIRES, 449 UCB
University of Colorado
City: Boulder
Province or State: CO
Postal Code: 80309
Ted Scambos
Role: INVESTIGATOR
Email: scambos@nsidc.org
Contact Address:
National Snow and Ice Data Center
CIRES, 449 UCB
City: Boulder
Province or State: CO
Postal Code: 80309-0449
William Emery
Role: INVESTIGATOR
Contact Address:
Colorado Center for Astrodynamics Research
University of Colorado
City: Boulder
Province or State: CO
Postal Code: 80309-0431
Chuck Fowler
Role: INVESTIGATOR
Contact Address:
Colorado Center for Astrodynamics Research
University of Colorado
City: Boulder
Province or State: CO
Postal Code: 80309-0431
Terry Haran
Role: INVESTIGATOR
Contact Address:
CIRES, 449 UCB
University of Colorado
City: Boulder
Province or State: CO
Postal Code: 80309-0449
Related URL
http://nsidc.org/data/nsidc-0065.html
Access to documentation and data
Reference
Cracknell, A.P. 1997. The Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer. London: Taylor & Francis.
Csiszar, I. and G. Gutman. 1999. Mapping global land surface albedo from NOAA AVHRR. Journal of Geophysical Research 104(D6):6215-6228. Emery, W.J., C.W. Fowler, and J.A. Maslanik. 1995. Satellite remote sensing of ice motion, in Oceanographic Applications of Remote Sensing, M. Ikeda and F.W. Dobson eds. Boca Raton: CRC Press, pp. 367-379.
Goodison, B.E. 1989. Determination of areal snow water equivalent on the Canadian prairies using passive microwave satellite data. IGARSS '89, Proceedings 3:1243-1246. Gustafson, G.B. et al. 1994. Support of Environmental Requirements for Cloud Analysis and Archive (SERCAA), Phillips Laboratory, Hanscom Air Force Base, Scientific Report No. 2, PL-TR-94-2114, 100 pp.
Hutchinson, T.A. and T.A. Scambos. 1997. High-resolution polar climate parameters derived from 1-km AVHRR data. Proceedings of the Eighth Symposium on Global Climate Change Studies, American Meteorological Society, Long Beach, CA, pp. 284-289.
Key, J. 1999. The cloud and surface parameter retrieval (CASPR) system for polar AVHRR. Cooperative Institute for Meteorological Satellite Studies, University of Wisconsin, Madison.
Key, J. and A.J. Schweiger. 1998. Tools for atmospheric radiative transfer: Streamer and FluxNet. Computers and Geosciences 24(5): 443-451.
Key, J., J. Collins, C. Fowler, and R.S. Stone. 1997. High-latitude surface temperature estimates from thermal satellite data. Remote Sensing of the Environment 61: 302-309.
Kidwell, K.D. 1995. NOAA Polar Orbiter Data User's Guide, U.S. Dept. of Commerce, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, NESDIS.
Maslanik, J.A., J. Key, C. Fowler, T. Nguyen, 2000. AVHRR-derived regional cloud and surface conditions during SHEBA and FIRE-ACE. Journal of Geophysical Research, in press.
Maslanik, J., C. Fowler, J. Key, T. Scambos, T. Hutchinson, and W. Emery, 1998. AVHRR-based Polar Pathfinder products for modeling applications. Annals of Glaciology 25: 388-392.
Meier, W.N., J.A. Maslanik, J.R. Key, and C.W. W. Fowler. 1997. Multiparameter AVHRR-derived products for Arctic climate studies, Earth Interactions, Vol. 1.
Ninnis, R.M., W.J. Emery, and M.J. Collins. 1986. Automated extraction of pack ice motion from advanced very high resolution radiometer imagery. Journal of Geophysical Research 91(C9): 10,725-10,734.
Rao, C.R.N. and J. Chen. 1999. Revised post-launch calibration of channels 1 and 2 of the Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer on board the NOAA-14 spacecraft.
Rao, C.R.N. and J. Chen. 1994. Post-launch calibration of the visible and near-infrared channels of the Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer on NOAA-7, -9, and -11 Spacecraft. NOAA Technical Report NESDIS 78, 22 pp.
Rao, C.R.N. 1993. Nonlinearity corrections for the thermal infrared channels of the AVHRR: Assessment and recommendations. NOAA Technical Report, NESDIS 69, 31 pp.
Rosborough, G.W., D.G. Baldwin, and W.J. Emery. 1994. Precise AVHRR image navigation. IEEE Transactions in Geosciences and Remote Sensing 32(3):644-657.
Saunders, R.W. and K.T. Kriebel. 1988. An improved method for detecting clear sky and cloudy radiances from AVHRR data. International Journal of Remote Sensing 9(1): 123-150.
Schweiger, A., C. Fowler, J. Key, J. Maslanik, J. Francis, R. Armstrong, M.J. Brodzik, T. Scambos, T. Haran, M. Ortmeyer, S. Khalsa, D. Rothrock, and R. Weaver. 1999. P-Cube: A multisensor data set for polar climate research. Proceedings on the 5th Conference on Polar Meteorology and Oceanography, American Meteorological Society, Dallas, TX, 15-20 Jan., 136-141.
Schweiger, A.J. and J.R. Key. 1992. Arctic cloudiness: Comparison of ISCCP-C2 and Nimbus-7 satellite-derived cloud products with a surface-based cloud climatology. Journal of Climate 5(12): 1514-1527.
Stowe, L.L., E.P. McClain, R. Carey, P. Pellegrino, and G.G. Gutman. 1991. Global distribution of cloud cover derived from NOAA/AVHRR operational satellite data. Advances in Space Research 11(3): 51-54.
Stroeve, J.C., J.E. Box, C. Fowler, T. Haran, and J. Key, 2000. Intercomparison between in situ and AVHRR Polar Pathfinder-derived surface albedo over Greenland. Remote Sensing of the Environment, in press.
Stroeve, J.C., 2000. Assessment of Greenland albedo variability from the AVHRR Polar Pathfinder data set. Journal of Geophysical Research, submitted for publication.
Suttles, J.T., R.N. Green, P. Minnis, G.L. Smith, W.F. Staylor, B.A. Wielicki, I.J. Walker, D.F. Young, V.R. Taylor, and L.L. Stowe. 1988. Angular radiation models for Earth-Atmosphere system. Volume I-Shortwave radiation, NASA Reference Publication 1184, 144 pp.
Walton, C.C., J.T. Sullivan, C.R.N. Rao, and M.P. Weinreb. 1998. Corrections for detector nonlinearities and calibration inconsistencies of the infrared channels of the advanced very high resolution radiometer. Journal of Geophysical Research 103(C2):3323-3337.
Yamanouchi, T., K. Suziki, and S. Kawaguchi. 1987. Detection of clouds in Antarctica from infrared multispectral data of AVHRR. Journal of Meteorological Society Japan 65(6): 949-961.
Metadata Name and Version
Metadata Name: CEOS IDN DIF
Metadata Version: 9.7
Creation and Review Dates
DIF Creation Date: 2000-06-07
Last DIF Revision Date: 2001-10-04
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