OMAERUV: Near-UV Aerosol Properties from Aura Satellite

NASA's Ozone Monitoring Instrument provides daily global measurements of aerosol properties from space with a 2600 km viewing swath. The OMAERUV product contains Aerosol Absorption and Extinction Optical Depths, Single Scattering Albedo at three wavelengths (354, 388, and 500 nm), and Aerosol Index at a 13x24 km resolution. This data supports tracking of pollutants like aerosols from biomass burning and industrial emissions.

Use Cases

• Tracking biomass burning and industrial aerosol plumes based on Aerosol Index and Optical Depth measurements.
• Modeling aerosol radiative forcing for climate studies using Single Scattering Albedo at three wavelengths.
• Assessing daily global air quality trends for EPA criteria pollutants based on the satellite's wide swath and daily coverage.
• Validating ground-based aerosol monitoring networks using the geolocated, orbit-level satellite data.

Strengths

• Provides daily global coverage due to the satellite's 14 orbits per day.
• Offers specific aerosol property measurements at three distinct wavelengths (354, 388, 500 nm).
• Data is from a long-running mission, with the Aura satellite launched in July 2004.

Limitations

• Key metadata like row count, file size, and specific column names are not provided on any platform.
• The 'last updated' field shows a future date (2026-04-09), indicating a potential metadata error.
• Documentation gaps exist, as the full algorithm description and ancillary parameters are not detailed.

Provenance

Source

NASA Goddard Earth Sciences Data and Information Services Center (GES DISC)

Collection Method

Satellite remote sensing data from the Ozone Monitoring Instrument (OMI) on the NASA Aura satellite.

Time Range

Data collection began after the Aura satellite launch in July 2004.

Freshness

The dataset description references a reprocessing release in April 2012, but a metadata field lists an update date of 2026-04-09.

Geography

Global coverage from the satellite's sunlit orbital swaths.