MODIS Daily Land Incident 4-km PAR Images For North America, 2003-2005

45,376 daily HDF files provide 4-km resolution estimates of Photosynthetically Active Radiation (PAR) over North America, derived from MODIS/Terra and MODIS/Aqua satellite swath data. The dataset contains four distinct image layers—DirectPAR, DiffusePAR, TotalPAR, and Observation Count—for each day across three years. This data was created specifically to fill a need for daily PAR estimates to model terrestrial ecosystem productivity.

Use Cases

• Modeling terrestrial ecosystem productivity based on daily incident PAR estimates.
• Analyzing spatial and temporal patterns of solar radiation in the 400-700 nm range across North America.
• Validating or calibrating other radiation models using the DirectPAR and DiffusePAR image layers.
• Studying interannual variability in light availability for vegetation from 2003 to 2005.

Strengths

• Contains a large volume of 45,376 individual data files, providing daily granularity.
• Offers high spatial specificity with 4 km x 4 km resolution across 46 MODIS tiles.
• Includes four distinct scientific data layers (DirectPAR, DiffusePAR, TotalPAR, Observation Count) per observation.

Limitations

• Temporal coverage is limited to a three-year window (2003-2005) and is not recent.
• Metadata on specific columns, exact file sizes, and detailed provenance (author) is missing or inconsistent across platforms.
• Platforms conflict on the 'last updated' date, with one showing a future date (2026-04-10), casting doubt on metadata accuracy.

Provenance

Source

National Aeronautics and Space Administration

Collection Method

Derived by integrating MODIS/Terra and MODIS/Aqua instantaneous PAR data estimated from 5-min L1b swath data.

Time Range

2003 - 2005

Freshness

2005-12-31 23:59:59.999000

Geography

MODIS tile subsets covering North America, Central America, portions of South America, and Greenland.