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Full catalog/Alaska_Yukon_NDVI_1614
Alaska_Yukon_NDVI_1614·v1·dataset

Peak greenness of northern Alaska and Yukon (MODIS NDVI)

ABoVE: MODIS-derived Maximum NDVI, Northern Alaska and Yukon Territory for 2002-2017
biosphere NASA ORNL_CLOUD Level 3 GeoTIFF
In plain English

What it measures. Maps of peak vegetation greenness across northern Alaska and Canada's Yukon for each year from 2002 to 2017, plus a single map of the greenest value over all 16 years. Greenness is a standard index that rises as plants grow more lush.

How it's made. Built from MODIS vegetation measurements on the Terra and Aqua satellites, taking the highest greenness value reached during each summer growing season and combining it to a 1-kilometer grid.

How & where you'd use it. Lets scientists track how northern vegetation is changing over time, a useful signal for studying warming and shifting plant life in the Arctic.

What's measured

BIOSPHERE › VEGETATION › VEGETATION INDEX › NORMALIZED DIFFERENCE VEGETATION INDEX (NDVI)

Coverage & cadence

  • Time span2002-06-01 → 2017-08-30
  • Measured byTerra (MODIS) · Aqua (MODIS)
  • Processing levelLevel 3
  • Spatial extent-175.762, 52.1694, -97.9305, 68.9658
  • FormatsGeoTIFF
  • StatusCOMPLETE

What you can do with it

  • Map vegetation, forests and biomass
  • Monitor ecosystem productivity and carbon
  • Support habitat and biodiversity studies
Official description

This dataset provides the maximum Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) at 1-km resolution over northern Alaska, USA and the Yukon Territory, Canada for each year from 2002-2017, as well as a 16 year maximum NDVI product. MODIS products MOD13Q1 and MYD13Q1 from Collection 6 were acquired at 250-m pixel size from June 1-August 30 of each year. Within each growing season from 2002-2017, the maximum NDVI was determined for each pixel. These maximum NDVI values were then aggregated to 1-km by selecting the maximum NDVI from the sixteen 250-m pixels values nested within each 1-km pixel. A long-term 16-year maximum NDVI was then derived from the time series of annual maximum NDVI values.

Get the data

alaska_yukon_ndvi_1614_access.py
import earthaccess
earthaccess.login(strategy="netrc")          # free Earthdata Login

results = earthaccess.search_data(
    short_name="Alaska_Yukon_NDVI_1614",
    version="1",
    bounding_box=(-122.5, 37.2, -121.8, 37.9),  # your area (W,S,E,N)
    temporal=("2024-01-01", "2024-12-31"),       # your dates
)
files = earthaccess.open(results)   # stream straight from ORNL_CLOUD
Browsing CMR needs no login. Downloading or streaming bytes needs a free Earthdata Login + the earthaccess package.