Aquarius Level 3: Sea Surface Salinity 28-Day Running Mean Maps

28-day running mean maps of sea surface salinity at 1-degree spatial resolution, derived from descending passes of the Aquarius/SAC-D satellite. This version 5.0 dataset is the official end-of-mission public release from the NASA and CONAE collaborative mission. The data is produced from radiometer and scatterometer measurements at L-band frequencies for salinity estimation.

Use Cases

• Modeling global ocean circulation patterns based on gridded salinity data.
• Studying freshwater input and evaporation cycles using 28-day running mean salinity maps.
• Calibrating and validating other satellite or in-situ salinity measurements based on this official mission release.
• Analyzing spatial salinity gradients for climate studies based on the 1-degree resolution product.

Strengths

• Represents the official version 5.0 end-of-mission public data release, suggesting a finalized processing standard.
• Provides data at a consistent 1-degree spatial resolution across multiple temporal averages.
• Derived from a dedicated satellite instrument with three radiometers and a scatterometer for surface roughness correction.

Limitations

• Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download.
• Row count is unknown, which may limit suitability assessment for large-scale ML applications.
• Contains only data from descending satellite passes, which may not provide full diurnal coverage.

Provenance

Source

National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) and Comision Nacional de Actividades Espaciales (CONAE)

Collection Method

Satellite remote sensing from the Aquarius instrument onboard the AQUARIUS/SAC-D satellite.

Time Range

Temporal coverage is not explicitly stated in the provided metadata.

Freshness

Last updated 2026-03-13 14:49:45.815154; freshness should be verified.

Geography

Global ocean coverage, inferred from the satellite mission description.