ABoVE: Soil Temperature and Moisture at 12 Alaskan Sites, 2016-2023

Soil temperature and volumetric water content measurements at 15 cm depth from 12 boreal and tundra sites across Alaska. The data were collected hourly from 2016-08 11 to 2023-09-02 using HOBO MicroStation Data Loggers with site-specific calibration for moisture sensors. This dataset is provided by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA).

Use Cases

• Modeling permafrost thaw dynamics based on long-term soil temperature time series.
• Analyzing post-fire ecosystem recovery based on soil moisture measurements at burned and unburned sites.
• Calibrating remote sensing soil moisture products using ground-truth volumetric water content data.
• Studying seasonal freeze-thaw cycles based on hourly temperature recordings at 15 cm depth.

Strengths

• Includes site-specific laboratory calibration curves for soil moisture sensors at seven sites.
• Hourly temporal resolution for detailed diurnal and seasonal analysis.
• Covers a seven-year period (2016-2023) across 12 geographically distributed sites.
• Collected at the same locations as complementary CO2 efflux and thaw depth datasets.

Limitations

• Data coverage varies by site; completeness of the hourly record is not guaranteed.
• Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download.
• Row count is unknown, which may limit suitability assessment.

Provenance

Source

National Aeronautics and Space Administration

Collection Method

Measurements from HOBO MicroStation Data Loggers with temperature and moisture smart sensors installed at 15 cm depth.

Time Range

2016-08-11 to 2023-09-02

Freshness

Last updated 2026-03-12 19:46:51.156748; freshness should be verified.

Geography

12 sites across Alaska, encompassing boreal and tundra ecosystems.