NASA EOS Project: MODIS Sea Surface Temperature (SST) from Aqua and Terra Satellites
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Description
NASA's Ocean Biology Processing Group produces this Level 3 (L3) sea surface temperature dataset using the Moderate-resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) onboard the Aqua and Terra satellites. The data includes daily, 8-day, monthly, and annual average skin SST products at 4.63 km and 9.26 km spatial resolution, derived from both long-wave and mid-infrared channels. Aqua was launched on May 4, 2002, into a sun-synchronous orbit as part of the Earth Observation Satellites (EOS) constellation.
Use Cases
Monitoring global ocean temperature trends based on daily and 8-day averaged SST products.
Comparing skin SST and SST4 (mid-infrared) algorithms for nighttime observations as described.
Studying spatial patterns of sea surface temperature using data gridded in an integerized sinusoidal area projection.
Analyzing long-term climate variability using the available annual average SST products.
Strengths
Data is sourced from NASA's MODIS instruments on two major satellites, Aqua and Terra, providing dual-platform observation.
Products are available at multiple temporal resolutions (daily, 8-day, monthly, annual) and two spatial resolutions (4.63 km and 9.26 km).
Includes two distinct SST products: a skin SST for day/night and a lower-uncertainty SST4 product for nighttime only.
Limitations
Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download.
Row count is unknown, which may limit suitability assessment for large-scale ML projects.
Last update date is unknown; freshness unverified.
Provenance
Source
NASA Ocean Biology Processing Group (OBPG), with algorithm development by Peter Minnett's team at the Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science (RSMAS).
Collection Method
Satellite remote sensing data from MODIS instruments, processed from Level 2 to spatially gridded Level 3 products.
Time Range
The dataset description does not specify a start or end date for the time series.
Freshness
The dataset description references a version R2019.0, which supersedes a previous v2014.1, but a specific last updated date is not provided.
Geography
Global coverage.
Data is hosted on AWS S3. The license is CC-BY-4.0.