PREFIRE: Polar Far-Infrared Outgoing Longwave Radiation

PREFIRE's Thermal Infrared Spectrometer measures mid- and far-infrared radiation across 63 channels from approximately 5 to 53 µm, a spectral range where most polar emissions occur but have not been measured on a large scale. The dataset provides Cloud-Optimized GeoTIFF files containing derived outgoing longwave radiation values, computed from spectral radiance, cloud mask, and auxiliary data. These rasterized images, with elements approximately 2.23 km wide, are designed to visualize data despite the much larger satellite ground footprints.

Use Cases

• Assimilating polar radiative flux data into global circulation models to improve climate predictions.
• Analyzing spatial patterns of outgoing longwave radiation in polar latitudes between 60° and 84°.
• Visualizing satellite-derived flux data in GIS software like QGIS using cloud-optimized GeoTIFFs.
• Characterizing far-infrared emissions to fill knowledge gaps in the global energy budget.

Strengths

• Provides measurements across 63 spectral channels in the critical 5-53 µm far-infrared range.
• Data collection started on June 29, 2024 and is ongoing, offering recent observations.
• Raster elements are approximately 2.23 km wide, providing a standardized grid for visualization.

Limitations

• Key metadata such as row count, file size, and specific license are missing or conflicting across platforms.
• The individual satellite ground footprints are about 80x larger than the rendered GeoTIFF raster elements, meaning the visualized data is an averaged representation.
• Geographic coverage is currently limited to latitudes between approximately 60° and 84° in both polar regions.

Provenance

Source

National Aeronautics and Space Administration

Collection Method

Derived from data collected by the PREFIRE Thermal Infrared Spectrometer aboard the PREFIRE-SAT2 CubeSat.

Time Range

Science data retrieval started June 29, 2024 and is ongoing.

Freshness

Last updated metadata date is 2026-04-09 23:10:09.183361.

Geography

Latitudes between approximately 60° to 84° in both polar regions.