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Full catalog/msutmt
msutmt·v6·dataset

How mid-air temperatures swing from normal

AMSU/MSU Midtroposphere Day/Month Temperature Anomalies and Annual Cycle V6
atmosphere NASA GHRC_DAAC Level 3 ASCIInetCDF-4
In plain English

What it measures. How temperatures in the middle layer of the atmosphere depart from the long-term normal (anomalies), along with the typical seasonal cycle, going back to 1978.

How it's made. Calculated from microwave readings by the MSU and AMSU-A instruments flown on a long series of NOAA satellites and Aqua, processed into a consistent long-term record.

How & where you'd use it. A go-to record for tracking long-term temperature trends and climate change in the atmosphere over several decades.

What's measured

Atmosphere › Atmospheric Temperature › Surface Temperature › Air Temperature

Coverage & cadence

  • Time span1978-01-01 → ongoing
  • Measured byNOAA-10 (MSU) · TIROS-N (MSU) · NOAA-9 (MSU) · NOAA-15 (AMSU-A) · NOAA-6 (MSU) · NOAA-14 (MSU) · NOAA-18 (AMSU-A) · NOAA-8 (MSU) · NOAA-11 (MSU) · NOAA-12 (MSU) · Aqua (AMSU-A) · NOAA-19 (AMSU-A) · NOAA-7 (MSU)
  • Processing levelLevel 3
  • Spatial extent-180, -90, 180, 90
  • FormatsASCII, netCDF-4
  • 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

The AMSU/MSU Midtroposphere Day/Month Temperature Anomalies and Annual Cycle V6 dataset consists of temperature anomalies and annual cycle temperatures derived from the Microwave Sounding Unit (MSU) and the Advanced Microwave Sounding Unit-A (AMSU-A) radiance data since January 1978. All products are derived for the mid-troposphere. The dataset begins on January 1, 1978 and is still currently ongoing. The data are available in netCDF-4 and ASCII formats.

Get the data

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

results = earthaccess.search_data(
    short_name="msutmt",
    version="6",
    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 GHRC_DAAC
Browsing CMR needs no login. Downloading or streaming bytes needs a free Earthdata Login + the earthaccess package.