Global Top of Atmosphere Thermal Radiance at 70-Meter Resolution

Data from 2018 onward is collected by the ECOSTRESS instrument aboard the International Space Station. It provides calibrated radiance values for five thermal infrared bands between 8 and 12.5 µm, gridded to a global 0.0006° resolution. The dataset is produced by LPCLOUD as part of NASA's Earthdata program.

Use Cases

• Modeling plant water stress by analyzing radiance values across five thermal infrared bands.
• Developing cloud and water mask algorithms using the provided data quality indicator layers.
• Calibrating land surface temperature models with at-sensor radiance values from the 8-12.5 µm spectrum.
• Investigating instrument artifacts and data gaps, such as striping in band 4, for sensor performance analysis.
• Studying global thermal patterns between 52° N and 52° S latitudes using the gridded radiance product.

Strengths

• Provides data for five distinct thermal infrared bands between 8 and 12.5 µm.
• Global coverage between 52° N and 52° S latitudes on a consistent 0.0006° grid.
• Contains 12 data layers including radiance, quality indicators, and masks within each HDF5 file.

Limitations

• Contains known data acquisition gaps, including a period from May 2019 to April 2023 where bands 1, 3, and 5 contain fill values.
• Instrument artifacts cause missing values and striping in specific bands, requiring interpolation.
• Scan overlap and flipping issues are documented, which can affect data continuity.

Provenance

Source

NASA Earthdata via LPCLOUD

Collection Method

Measured by the ECOSTRESS instrument on the International Space Station, resampled and projected to a global grid.

Time Range

2018 onward

Freshness

null

Geography

Global coverage between 52° North and 52° South latitude.