GOLD TLIMB: Exospheric Temperature from N2 Limb Airglow Profiles

NASA's GOLD mission provides exospheric temperature (TLIMB) data derived from limb scans of N2 LBH airglow emissions in the 137-160 nm range. The retrieval algorithm fits a Chapman function to brightness profiles between 100 and 300 km altitude to infer temperature, independent of absolute calibration. The dataset is produced by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration and was last updated in March 2026.

Use Cases

• Modeling thermospheric temperature and density based on exospheric temperature retrievals.
• Validating atmospheric models using limb-scan airglow profile shapes.
• Studying daytime, non-auroral atmospheric processes in the low-latitude thermosphere.
• Analyzing the relationship between scale height and temperature in diffusion equilibrium.

Strengths

• Algorithm has heritage from other planetary missions like TIMED/GUVI, Cassini/UVIS, and MAVEN/IUVS.
• Retrieval is independent of absolute brightness calibration, relying only on profile shape.
• Data covers a specific latitude range from the equator to approximately 20 degrees.

Limitations

• Description metadata is limited; actual data quality requires manual inspection after download.
• 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

Derived from GOLD satellite limb scan measurements of N2 LBH airglow emissions, processed using an IDL-based operational algorithm.

Freshness

Last updated 2026-03-13 07:30:59.210242; freshness should be verified.

Geography

Latitude range from the equator to ~20 degrees in one hemisphere at a time.