SOR3XPS6: Solar Extreme Ultraviolet Irradiance 6-Hour Means

Six-hour averaged solar spectral irradiance measurements from the SORCE XUV Photometer System (XPS) cover the extreme ultraviolet (0.1-27 nm) and Lyman-alpha (121-122 nm) wavelength ranges. Data are reported for seven specific photometer diodes, with each row containing date, diode-specific wavelength bands, irradiance statistics, and associated uncertainty metrics. The dataset is corrected to a mean solar distance of 1 AU and is provided in a single ASCII text file.

Use Cases

• Modeling atmospheric ionization and thermospheric heating based on solar extreme ultraviolet (EUV) flux.
• Studying solar cycle variability using long-term, 6-hourly irradiance time series.
• Validating solar irradiance models with direct, broad-band measurements from specific photometer diodes.
• Assessing instrument degradation over time using the included degradation model and version fields.

Strengths

• Provides specific accuracy estimates (12-30%) and long-term repeatability (1% per year) for the irradiance data.
• Includes detailed uncertainty quantification via columns for absolute uncertainty, measurement precision, and calculation precision.
• Data is normalized to standard observational conditions (1 AU, zero line-of-sight velocity).

Limitations

• Key metadata such as row count, file size, and temporal coverage of the data collection are not provided by any source.
• The license is ambiguously listed as 'other-license-specified' without further details on usage restrictions.
• Column names are described generically ('date', 'Julian day') but the exact column list and order are not explicitly provided.

Provenance

Source

National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), SORCE mission.

Collection Method

Measurements from the SORCE XUV Photometer System (XPS), processed to Level 3 (derived geophysical variables).

Freshness

2026-04-09 20:31:40.889101