Greenland Ice Sheet Melt Characteristics Derived from Passive Microwave Data, Version 1
The Greenland ice sheet melt extent data, acquired as part of the NASA Program for Arctic Regional Climate Assessment (PARCA), is a daily (or every other day, prior to August 1987) estimate of the spatial extent of wet snow on the Greenland ice sheet since 1979. It is derived from passive microwave satellite brightness temperature characteristics using the Cross-Polarized Gradient Ratio (XPGR) of Abdalati and Steffen (1997). It is physically based on the changes in microwave emission characteristics observable in data from the Scanning Multi-channel Microwave Radiometer (SMMR) and the Special Sensor Microwave/Imager (SSM/I) instruments when surface snow melts. It is not a direct measure of the snow wetness but rather is a binary indicator of the state of melt of each SMMR and SSM/I pixel on the ice sheet for each day of observation. It is, however, a useful proxy for the amount of melt that occurs on the Greenland ice sheet. The data are provided in a variety of formats including raw data in ASCII format, gridded daily data in binary format, and annual and complete time series climatologies in gridded binary and GeoTIFF format. All data are in a 60 x 109 pixel subset of the standard Northern Hemisphere polar stereographic grid with a 25 km resolution and are available via FTP.
| Science Keywords: | |||
| Spatial Extent: | Bounding Rectangle: N: 84.0 S: 60.0 E: -10.0 W: -73.0 |
Data Format(s): | n/a |
| Temporal Extent: | Platform(s): | DMSP 5D-2/F11, DMSP 5D-2/F13, DMSP 5D-2/F8, NIMBUS-7, Nimbus-7 | |
| Data Center(s): | NSIDC | Instrument(s): | SSM/I, SMMR |
| Version: | 1 | ||
- Title: Greenland Ice Sheet Melt Characteristics Derived from Passive Microwave Data, Version 1
- Version: 1
- Publisher: National Snow and Ice Data Center
- GENERAL DOCUMENTATION: https://doi.org/10.5067/NON9395MQ9TK, Includes a user's guide, supplemental documents like ATBDs and academic papers, How Tos, FAQs, etc.
Collection Information
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Purpose
Scientific Research -
DOI
10.5067/NON9395MQ9TK
Data Identification
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Processing Level
Level 3
Geophysical variables mapped on a grid
- Quality
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Collection Progress
Planned
Related URLs
Other Descriptive Keywords
ISO Topic Categories
- IMAGERY/BASE MAPS/EARTH COVER
- GEOSCIENTIFIC INFORMATION
Acquisition Information
Temporal Information
Spatial Information
| Coverage Type | Zone Identifier | Geometry | Granule Representation |
|---|---|---|---|
| HORIZONTAL | CARTESIAN | GEODETIC |
Location Keywords
- Continent
- North America
- Greenland
Data Centers
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NSIDC
ARCHIVER-
National Snow and Ice Data Center
CIRES, 449 UCB
University of Colorado
Boulder, CO 80309-0449
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NSIDC
DISTRIBUTOR-
National Snow and Ice Data Center
CIRES, 449 UCB
University of Colorado
Boulder, CO 80309-0449
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Data Contacts
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Waleed Abdalati
Technical ContactWaleed Abdalati
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Boulder, CO 80309
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NSIDC Services
Technical ContactNSIDC Services
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CIRES, 449 UCB
University of Colorado
Boulder, CO 80309-0449
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Waleed Abdalati
Technical ContactWaleed Abdalati
This contact does not have any addresses listed.
This contact does not have any contact mechanisms listed.
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National Snow and Ice Data Center
User ServicesNational Snow and Ice Data Center
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Boulder, Colorado
This contact does not have any contact mechanisms listed.
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Archive And Distribution Information
There is no archive and distribution information for this collection.