AIRS Monthly Atmospheric Retrievals: Global 1-Degree Gridded Data

Global atmospheric data from the AIRS instrument aboard NASA's Aqua satellite provides monthly averaged geophysical parameters on a 1-degree latitude/longitude grid. The dataset includes thermodynamic variables like temperature profiles, cloud properties, and surface parameters, alongside trace gas concentrations for carbon monoxide, methane, and ozone. It is produced by NASA's GES DISC.

Use Cases

• Analyzing global skin temperature patterns using the 'Skin Temperature' variable.
• Tracking atmospheric methane concentrations with the 'Total Amounts and Vertical Profiles of Methane' data.
• Studying cloud cover and height distributions via 'Cloud Amount/Frequency' and 'Cloud Height' parameters.
• Investigating tropopause characteristics and column precipitable water for climate model validation.
• Examining surface pressure and air temperature at the surface for weather and climate studies.

Strengths

• Data is spatially averaged into a consistent global 1-degree grid, facilitating comparative analysis.
• Includes standard deviation and count maps for each variable, allowing assessment of data uncertainty.
• Combines visible, infrared, and microwave sensor data for a multi-spectral atmospheric profile.

Limitations

• Specific column names and dataset size (row count, file size) are not provided in the available metadata.
• Sources conflict on license information: one lists 'other-license-specified', others list it as unknown.
• The temporal coverage (start and end dates) of the dataset is not specified.

Provenance

Source

GES_DISC

Collection Method

Retrievals from the Atmospheric Infrared Sounder (AIRS) grating spectrometer aboard the EOS Aqua satellite.

Freshness

2026-03-13 18:34:11.023915

Geography

Global coverage from -180.0 to +180.0 deg longitude and -90.0 to +90.0 deg latitude.