Name: MEaSUREs Global Record of Daily Landscape Freeze/Thaw Status, Version 2
Creator: National Snow and Ice Data Center
Keywords: FREEZE/THAW

MEaSUREs Global Record of Daily Landscape Freeze/Thaw Status, Version 2

Data set id:

NSIDC-0477

DOI: 10.5067/MEASURES/CRYOSPHERE/nsidc-0477.002

Data Citation and Acknowledgment
As a condition of using these data, you must cite the use of this data set. Such a practice gives credit to data set producers and advances principles of transparency and reproducibility.

Kim, Y., Kimball, J. S., Glassy, J. & McDonald, K. C. (2013). MEaSUREs Global Record of Daily Landscape Freeze/Thaw Status. (NSIDC-0477, Version 2). [Data Set]. Boulder, Colorado USA. NASA National Snow and Ice Data Center Distributed Active Archive Center. https://doi.org/10.5067/MEASURES/CRYOSPHERE/nsidc-0477.002. [describe subset used if applicable]. Date Accessed 10-31-2025.

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There is a more recent version of these data.
Version Summary

Changes for this Version 2 release include: an extended FT record enabled by overlapping SMMR and SSM/I brightness temperature time series; a new FT record derived from AMSR-E; refined data Quality Assessment (QA) annual maps; new format options (GeoTIFF with an ESRI projection file); and quick-look GIF browse images.

Overview

The MEaSUREs Global Record of Daily Landscape Freeze/Thaw Status Version 2 product is a global record of the daily freeze/thaw (FT) status of the landscape derived from satellite observations of radiometric brightness temperatures. Two FT records are provided: a Scanning Multichannel Microwave Radiometer (SMMR) and Special Sensor Microwave/Imager (SSM/I) record for the years 1979 to 2010; and an Advanced Microwave Scanning Radiometer - Earth Observing System (AMSR-E) record for the years 2002 to 2011.

Parameter(s):

FREEZE/THAW

Platform(s):

AQUA

DMSP 5D-2/F11

DMSP 5D-2/F13

DMSP 5D-2/F8

Nimbus-7

Sensor(s):

AMSR-E

SMMR

SSM/I

Data Format(s):

GIF

HDF

Binary

GeoTIFF

Temporal Coverage:

1 January 1979 to 31 December 2010
19 June 2002 to 27 September 2011

Temporal Resolution:

1 day

Spatial Resolution:

25 km

25km

Spatial Reference System(s):

Not Specified

Spatial Coverage:

N:
86.7167
S:
-86.7167
E:
179.9999
W:
-179.9999

Blue outlined yellow areas on the map below indicate the spatial coverage for this data set.

View Metadata Record

Data Access & Tools

This data set has been retired. There is a more recent version of these data.

Documentation

Sensor and Instrument Information

AMSR-E Instrument Description

Help Articles

How to Articles

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Many NSIDC DAAC data sets can be accessed using NSIDC DAAC's Data Access Tool. This tool provides the ability to search and filter data with spatial and temporal constraints using a map-based interface.Users have the option to:

The NSIDC Data Map Services Application Programming Interface (API) provides HTTP URLs for requesting geo-registered map images from NSIDC's geospatial database. A WMS request defines the geographic layer(s) and area of interest to be processed.

We recommend using the Geospatial Data Abstraction Library (GDAL) to convert GeoTIFF files into a different format.

To convert HDF5 files into binary format you will need to use the h5dump utility, which is part of the HDF5 distribution available from the HDF Group. How you install HDF5 depends on your operating system.

NASA Earthdata Cloud Data Access Guide

The NASA Earthdata Cloud is the NASA cloud-based archive of Earth observations. It is hosted by Amazon Web Services (AWS). Learn how to find and access NSIDC DAAC data directly in the cloud.

NASA Worldview is a map interface that allows users to interactively browse imagery, create visualizations, and download the underlying data.

NASA's Global Imagery Browse Services (GIBS) provides up to date, full resolution imagery for selected NSIDC DAAC data sets.