Data coverage
The version 5.0 Aquarius CAP Level 2 product contains the fourth release of the AQUARIUS/SAC-D orbital/swath data based on the Combined Active Passive (CAP) algorithm. CAP is a P.I. produced dataset developed and provided by JPL. This Level 2 dataset contains sea surface salinity (SSS), wind speed and wind direction data derived from 3 different radiometers and the onboard scatterometer. The CAP algorithm simultaneously retrieves the salinity, wind speed and direction by minimizing the sum of squared differences between model and observations. The main improvements in CAP V5.0 relative to the previous version include: updates to the Geophysical Model Functions to 4th order harmonics with the inclusion of sea surface temperature (SST) and stability at air-sea interface effects; use of the Canadian Meteorological Center (CMC) SST product as the new source ancillary sea surface temperature data in place of NOAA OI SST. Each L2 data file covers one 98 minute orbit. The Aquarius instrument is onboard the AQUARIUS/SAC-D satellite, a collaborative effort between NASA and the Argentinian Space Agency Comision Nacional de Actividades Espaciales (CONAE). The instrument consists of three radiometers in push broom alignment at incidence angles of 29, 38, and 46 degrees incidence angles relative to the shadow side of the orbit. Footprints for the beams are: 76 km (along-track) x 94 km (cross-track), 84 km x 120 km and 96km x 156 km, yielding a total cross-track swath of 370 km. The radiometers measure brightness temperature at 1.413 GHz in their respective horizontal and vertical polarizations (TH and TV). A scatterometer operating at 1.26 GHz measures ocean backscatter in each footprint that is used for surface roughness corrections in the estimation of salinity. The scatterometer has an approximate 390km swath. AQUARIUSL3SSSRAINCORRECTEDCAP7DAYV5 Version 5.0 Aquarius CAP Level 3 products are the fourth release of the AQUARIUS/SAC-D mapped salinity and wind speed data based on the Combined Active Passive (CAP) algorithm. CAP Level 3 standard mapped image products contain gridded 1 degree spatial resolution salinity and wind speed data averaged over 7 day and monthly time scales. This particular dataset is the 7-Day running mean sea surface salinity (SSS) rain corrected V5.0 Aquarius CAP product. CAP is a P.I. produced dataset developed and provided by JPL. The CAP algorithm utilizes data from both the onboard radiometer and scatterometer to simultaneously retrieve salinity, wind speed and direction by minimizing the sum of squared differences between model and observations. The main improvements in CAP V5.0 relative to the previous version include: updates to the Geophysical Model Functions to 4th order harmonics with the inclusion of sea surface temperature (SST) and stability at air-sea interface effects; use of the Canadian Meteorological Center (CMC) SST product as the new source ancillary sea surface temperature data in place of NOAA OI SST. The Aquarius instrument is onboard the AQUARIUS/SAC-D satellite, a collaborative effort between NASA and the Argentinian Space Agency Comision Nacional de Actividades Espaciales (CONAE). The instrument consists of three radiometers in push broom alignment at incidence angles of 29, 38, and 46 degrees incidence angles relative to the shadow side of the orbit. Footprints for the beams are: 76 km (along-track) x 94 km (cross-track), 84 km x 120 km and 96km x 156 km, yielding a total cross-track swath of 370 km. The radiometers measure brightness temperature at 1.413 GHz in their respective horizontal and vertical polarizations (TH and TV). A scatterometer operating at 1.26 GHz measures ocean backscatter in each footprint that is used for surface roughness corrections in the estimation of salinity. The scatterometer has an approximate 390km swath. AQUARIUSL3SSSCAP7DAYV5 Version 5.0 Aquarius CAP Level 3 products are the fourth release of the AQUARIUS/SAC-D mapped salinity and wind speed data based on the Combined Active Passive (CAP) algorithm. Level 3 standard mapped image products contain gridded 1 degree spatial resolution salinity and wind speed data averaged over 7 day and monthly time scales. This particular dataset is the 7-Day running mean sea surface salinity (SSS) V5.0 Aquarius CAP product. CAP is a P.I. produced dataset developed and provided by JPL. The CAP algorithm utilizes data from both the onboard radiometer and scatterometer to simultaneously retrieve salinity, wind speed and direction by minimizing the sum of squared differences between model and observations. The main improvements in CAP V5.0 relative to the previous version include: updates to the Geophysical Model Functions to 4th order harmonics with the inclusion of sea surface temperature (SST) and stability at air-sea interface effects; use of the Canadian Meteorological Center (CMC) SST product as the new source ancillary sea surface temperature data in place of NOAA OI SST. The Aquarius instrument is onboard the AQUARIUS/SAC-D satellite, a collaborative effort between NASA and the Argentinian Space Agency Comision Nacional de Actividades Espaciales (CONAE). The instrument consists of three radiometers in push broom alignment at incidence angles of 29, 38, and 46 degrees incidence angles relative to the shadow side of the orbit. Footprints for the beams are: 76 km (along-track) x 94 km (cross-track), 84 km x 120 km and 96km x 156 km, yielding a total cross-track swath of 370 km. The radiometers measure brightness temperature at 1.413 GHz in their respective horizontal and vertical polarizations (TH and TV). A scatterometer operating at 1.26 GHz measures ocean backscatter in each footprint that is used for surface roughness corrections in the estimation of salinity. The scatterometer has an approximate 390km swath. AQUARIUSANCILLARYCELESTIALSKYV1 This datasets contains three maps of L-band (wavelength = 21 cm) brightness temperature of the celestial sky ("Galaxy") used in the processing of the NASA Aquarius instrument data. The maps report Sky brightness temperatures in Kelvin gridded on the Earth Centered Inertial (ECI) reference frame epoch J2000. They are sampled over 721 Declinations between -90 degrees and +90 degrees and 1441 Right Ascensions between 0 degrees and 360 degrees, all evenly spaced at 0.25 degrees intervals. The brightness temperatures are assumed temporally invariant and polarization has been neglected. They include microwave continuum and atomic hydrogen line (HI) emissions. The maps differ only in how the strong radio source Cassiopeia A has been included into the whole sky background surveys: 1/ TBnoCasA does not include Cassiopeia A and reports only the whole Sky surveys. 2/ TBCasA1cell spread Cas A total flux homogeneously over 1 map grid cell (i.e. 9.8572E-6 sr). 3/ TBCasAbeam spreads Cas A over surrounding grid cells using a convolution by a Gaussian beam with HPBW of 35 arcmin (equivalent to the instrument used for the Sky surveys). Cassiopeia A is a supernova remnant (SNR) in the constellation Cassiopeia and the brightest extra-solar radio source in the sky at frequencies above 1. AQUARIUSL2SSSV5 The version 5.0 Aquarius Level 2 product is the official third release of the orbital/swath data from AQUARIUS/SAC-D mission. The Aquarius Level 2 data set contains sea surface salinity (SSS) and wind speed data derived from 3 different radiometers and the onboard scatterometer. Included also in the Level 2 data are the horizontal and vertical brightness temperatures (TH and TV) for each radiometer, ancillary data, flags, converted telemetry and navigation data. Each data file covers one 98 minute orbit. The Aquarius instrument is onboard the AQUARIUS/SAC-D satellite, a collaborative effort between NASA and the Argentinian Space Agency Comision Nacional de Actividades Espaciales (CONAE). The instrument consists of three radiometers in push broom alignment at incidence angles of 29, 38, and 46 degrees incidence angles relative
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