Aqua MODIS Daily Land Surface Temperature and Emissivity Swath Data

MODIS/Aqua satellite data provides daily land surface temperature and 3-band emissivity estimates at 1km resolution. The product is generated in 5-minute temporal increments using a physics-based Temperature/Emissivity Separation algorithm. LPCLOUD produced this Version 6 product, which was decommissioned in July 2023.

Use Cases

• Analyze diurnal land surface temperature variations using the 5-minute temporal increments of satellite acquisition.
• Model surface energy fluxes by combining retrieved land surface temperature with the three spectral emissivity bands (29, 31, 32).
• Monitor thermal anomalies like fires or volcanic activity by identifying extreme high temperature values retained in the output.
• Study atmospheric correction under humid conditions using the improved Water Vapor Scaling scheme described in the algorithm.
• Assess retrieval stability in desert regions by applying Quality Control filtering to pixels contaminated by undetected cloud and dust.

Strengths

• Daily global coverage at a nadir spatial resolution of 1,000 meters.
• Swath dimensions of approximately 2,030 pixels along track and 1,354 pixels per line.
• Algorithm dynamically retrieves both temperature and emissivity simultaneously from three thermal infrared bands.

Limitations

• Contains known high temperature outliers, especially over desert regions like the Sahara, due to undetected cloud and dust.
• Product availability has a two-month latency after satellite data acquisition.
• This specific Version 6 data product was decommissioned on July 31, 2023.

Provenance

Source

NASA LPCLOUD, derived from MODIS/Aqua satellite sensor.

Collection Method

Produced using the ASTER Temperature/Emissivity Separation technique on MODIS thermal infrared bands.

Time Range

Coverage spans the MODIS/Aqua operational period until product decommissioning.

Freshness

Data production was daily, but the final version update was in February 2023 before decommissioning.

Geography

Global swath coverage from the Aqua satellite's orbit.