SMAP-SSS: Global Sea Surface Salinity Monthly Gridded Data

From April 1, 2015 to the present, this dataset provides monthly averaged, globally gridded sea surface salinity measurements from NASA's Soil Moisture Active Passive (SMAP) satellite. The Version 5.0 product, produced by Remote Sensing Systems, introduces formal uncertainty estimates and improved sea-ice correction using direct AMSR-2 brightness temperature data. It offers two spatial resolution products, with the default 70km data recommended for open ocean applications due to lower noise.

Use Cases

• Monitoring long-term trends in ocean salinity for climate change studies based on the continuous data record from 2015 onward.
• Analyzing salinity gradients near sea-ice edges for polar research, enabled by the improved AMSR-2-based sea-ice correction.
• Assimilating satellite-derived salinity data into ocean circulation models using the gridded 0.25-degree x 0.25-degree format.
• Comparing the performance of 70km and 40km resolution salinity retrievals for specific regional studies.

Strengths

• Provides a continuous, ongoing time series of global salinity data since April 2015.
• Version 5.0 includes formal uncertainty estimates for all salinity retrievals, a key improvement over prior versions.
• Improved sea-ice edge detection allows for salinity measurements closer to polar regions.

Limitations

• Key structural metadata (column names, row counts, file sizes) is missing from all platform entries.
• The dataset has a one-month latency in processing and availability, limiting real-time applications.
• The scatterometer instrument malfunctioned in July 2015, which likely affects the original active sensing capabilities.

Provenance

Source

NASA Soil Moisture Active Passive (SMAP) observatory, data processed operationally by Remote Sensing Systems (RSS).

Collection Method

Satellite remote sensing via an L-band radiometer (1.41GHz), with data gridded into monthly averages.

Time Range

2015-04-01 to present (ongoing)

Freshness

2026-04-09 22:26:00.766723

Geography

Global