MEaSUREs Greenland Ice Sheet SAR Mosaics

NASA MEaSUREs program data provides high-resolution mosaics of radar backscatter for the Greenland Ice Sheet derived from synthetic aperture radar (SAR) data. Both calibrated and uncalibrated mosaics are available for specific winter periods between 2000-2001 and 2012-2013, plus a multiyear composite. All mosaics are provided at 100 m and 20 m resolutions.

Use Cases

• Monitoring ice sheet surface change over time based on calibrated radar backscatter mosaics.
• Analyzing ice sheet surface properties using high-resolution (20 m) synthetic aperture radar data.
• Creating multi-year composite maps for baseline studies from the provided multiyear composite mosaic.

Strengths

• Provides data at two specific spatial resolutions: 100 m and 20 m.
• Covers multiple winter seasons across a 13-year period from 2000-2001 to 2012-2013.

Limitations

• Metadata completeness is low; column names and dataset size are unknown.
• Sources conflict on last update date (2013 vs. 2026), casting doubt on data freshness.
• License is ambiguously specified as 'other-license-specified' without details.

Provenance

Source

National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) Making Earth System Data Records for Use in Research Environments (MEaSUREs) program.

Collection Method

Derived from synthetic aperture radar (SAR) data.

Time Range

Winters of 2000-2001, 2005-2006 through 2008-2009, 2009-2010, 2012-2013, plus a multiyear composite.

Freshness

2026-04-10 (from datagov, but conflicts with older nasa_earthdata date)

Geography

Greenland Ice Sheet