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Full catalog/ML2SO2
ML2SO2·v005·dataset

Sulfur dioxide from volcanoes and pollution (Aura)

MLS/Aura Level 2 Sulfur Dioxide (SO2) Mixing Ratio V005 (ML2SO2) at GES DISC
atmosphere NASA GES_DISC Level 2 active
In plain English

What it measures. Measures sulfur dioxide at different altitudes in the atmosphere as a vertical profile. Sulfur dioxide is a gas released by volcanoes and by burning fossil fuels.

How it's made. Derived from microwave signals collected by the Aura satellite's Microwave Limb Sounder as it views sideways through the atmosphere's edge.

How & where you'd use it. Mainly used to study volcanic plumes and atmospheric chemistry; this is a research-grade product for specialists rather than a general-purpose dataset.

What's measured

ATMOSPHERE › ATMOSPHERIC CHEMISTRY › SULFUR COMPOUNDS › SULFUR DIOXIDE

Coverage & cadence

  • Time span2004-08-02 → ongoing
  • Measured byAura (MLS)
  • Processing levelLevel 2
  • Spatial extent-180, -82, 180, 82
  • StatusACTIVE

What you can do with it

  • Map air pollutants — NO₂, aerosols, ozone
  • Track greenhouse gases and Earth's energy budget
  • Feed weather and air-quality analysis
Official description

ML2SO2 is the EOS Aura Microwave Limb Sounder (MLS) standard product for sulfur dioxide derived from radiances measured by the 240 GHz radiometer. The data version is 5.0. Spatial coverage is near-global (-82 degrees to +82 degrees latitude), with each profile spaced 1.5 degrees or ~165 km along the orbit track (roughly 15 orbits per day). The recommended useful vertical range is from 215 to 10 hPa, and the vertical resolution is about 3 km. Users of the ML2SO2 data product should read section 3.21 of the EOS MLS Level 2 Version 5 Quality Document for more information. The data are stored in the version 5 EOS Hierarchical Data Format (HDF-EOS5), which is based on the version 5 Hierarchical Data Format, or HDF-5. Each file contains two swath objects (profile and column data), each with a set of data and geolocation fields, swath attributes, and metadata.

Get the data

ml2so2_access.py
import earthaccess
earthaccess.login(strategy="netrc")          # free Earthdata Login

results = earthaccess.search_data(
    short_name="ML2SO2",
    version="005",
    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 GES_DISC
Browsing CMR needs no login. Downloading or streaming bytes needs a free Earthdata Login + the earthaccess package.