Overview
With
funding from the NOAA/NESDIS Office of Research and Applications
(ORA), we have initiated a pilot project for reprocessing the entire
AVHRR GAC archive within ORA. This project is just one component
of a larger effort. PATMOS-x is the next generation of the PATMOS
project which ceased in 1999. PATMOS reprocessed the data from
afternoon AVHRR's from 1981 to 1999 and its data is available via
CLASS. PATMOS-x differs from the original PATMOS in many ways.
Note, PATMOS-x is not part of the now defunct NOAA/NASA Pathfinder
Program nor is it guided by the original PATMOS science steering
committee.
PATMOS-x is a project to derive atmospheric and surfac climate records from the roughly 25 years of data from NOAA's Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer (AVHRR) flown on the POES spacecraft. PATMOS-x consists of twice daily fields from all of AVHRR/2 and AVHRR/3 data from 1981 to the present. In addition, monthly averaged fields are also available from single and multiple satellites. The PATMOS-x philosophy is to generate multiple products (cloud, aerosol, surface and radiometric) on the same grid using a common processing path. While the spatial resolution (0.5deg) is coarser than that typically offered by other climatologies that focus on surface products, we feel that having all of products togethers allows for a more thorough diagnosis of any one time-series.
The specific goals of PATMOS-x are
- demonstrate that ORA could develop the infrastructure for reprocessing
of the 32 TB of AVHRR GAC data and prepare for the coming NESDIS
SDS program.
- Implement improved algorithms develop since the end of PATMOS
that mitigate weaknesses noted in PATMOS or add new products.
- make climate data records (both radiometric and derived products) in an easy to use format and size for the existing PATMOS users and NOAA's climate data customers in general (in partnership with NCDC).
- Develop cloud climatologies that are physically consistent
with those from EOS and NPOESS so that the 30 years of POES data
contribute the climate missions of more advanced sensors.
- Improve the accuracy of the geolocation and reflectance calibrations
of the AVHRR data-record
PATMOS-x speaks to the following NOAA goals:
- Understand Climate Variability and Change to Enhance Society's Ability to Plan and Respond
- Serve Society's Needs for Weather and Water Information
