ASTER GED: Global Land Surface Temperature and Emissivity, 2000-2008

NASA's ASTER GED product provides land surface temperature and emissivity data derived from all clear-sky ASTER satellite scenes acquired between 2000 and 2008. The data is generated using the ASTER Temperature Emissivity Separation algorithm with a Water Vapor Scaling atmospheric correction method, incorporating MODIS atmospheric profiles and the MODTRAN 5.2 radiative transfer model. The National Aeronautics and Space Administration’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory developed this dataset, which is available in HDF5 format.

Use Cases

• Modeling climate change impacts based on historical land surface temperature data.
• Analyzing surface energy budgets based on global emissivity measurements.
• Validating other satellite-derived thermal products based on the ASTER TES algorithm outputs.
• Studying land cover changes over time based on clear-sky pixel data from 2000-2008.

Strengths

• Data is derived from a well-defined, scientifically rigorous processing chain using the ASTER TES and WVS methods.
• Provides a global, consistent dataset with a specific temporal coverage from 2000 through 2008.
• Developed by NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, indicating authoritative provenance.

Limitations

• Description metadata is limited; actual data quality, resolution, and structure require manual inspection after download.
• The dataset's last update date is unknown; its freshness and potential supersession by newer products are unverified.
• Row count and specific column-level documentation are absent, which may limit suitability assessment for specific ML tasks.

Provenance

Source

NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology.

Collection Method

Generated from clear-sky pixels of ASTER satellite scenes using the ASTER TES algorithm with WVS atmospheric correction.

Time Range

2000 through 2008.

Freshness

Data covers 2000-2008; the AG1kmB Version 3 dataset was decommissioned in December 2016, suggesting users should seek the recommended HDF5 versions.

Geography

Global.