How warm the sea surface is (REMSS blended analysis)
What it measures. A daily, gap-free global map of sea surface temperature at fine detail, blending many satellites for a single best estimate.
How it's made. Produced at Remote Sensing Systems by combining temperature readings from microwave sensors (which can see through clouds) and higher-detail infrared sensors, merged with optimal interpolation; this version adds VIIRS on NOAA-20 and other updates. It uses no in-water buoy data.
How & where you'd use it. Useful for ocean and weather monitoring, climate research, and tracking sea-surface temperature patterns worldwide.
What's measured
Coverage & cadence
- Time span2002-06-01 → ongoing
- Measured byAqua (MODIS) · Terra (MODIS) · GPM (GMI) · Suomi-NPP (VIIRS) · GCOM-W1 (AMSR2) · NOAA-20 (VIIRS) · Aqua (AMSR-E) · TRMM (TMI) · CORIOLIS (WINDSAT)
- Processing levelLevel 4
- Spatial extent-179, -90, 180, 90
- FormatsnetCDF-4
- StatusACTIVE
What you can do with it
- Watch sea-surface temperature and marine heatwaves
- Spot algal blooms and ocean-colour shifts
- Support fisheries and coastal monitoring
Official description
A Group for High Resolution Sea Surface Temperature (GHRSST) global Level 4 sea surface temperature analysis produced daily on a 0.09-degree grid at Remote Sensing Systems. This product uses optimal interpolation (OI) from microwave (MW) sensors including the Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission (TRMM) Microwave Imager (TMI), the NASA Advanced Microwave Scanning Radiometer-EOS (AMSR-E), the WindSat on the Coriolis satellite, the Global Precipitation Measurement (GPM) Microwave Imager (GMI), and the Advanced Microwave Scanning Radiometer 2 (AMSR2) onboard the GCOM-W1 satellite, as well as infrared (IR) sensors such as the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on the NASA Aqua and Terra platforms and the Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite (VIIRS) on board the Suomi-NPP and NOAA-20 satellites. These MW sensors are used through the SST production based on the sensor data availability. The through-cloud capabilities of microwave radiometers provide a valuable picture of global sea surface temperature (SST) while infrared radiometers (i.e., MODIS) have a higher spatial resolution. This analysis does not use any in situ SST data such as drifting buoy SST. Compared with the previous version 5.0 dataset, version 5.1 is processed using updated input files, VIIRS on NOAA-20 is included, the sensor-specific error statistics (SSES) for each microwave sensor are updated, and deficiencies in the OI processing have been addressed.
Get the data
import earthaccess
earthaccess.login(strategy="netrc") # free Earthdata Login
results = earthaccess.search_data(
short_name="MW_IR_OI-REMSS-L4-GLOB-v5.1",
version="5.1",
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 POCLOUD Browsing CMR needs no login. Downloading or streaming bytes needs a free Earthdata Login + the earthaccess package. Official links
- Data Use and Citation Guidelines VIEW RELATED INFORMATION
- GHRSST Project homepage VIEW RELATED INFORMATION
- Generic Data Readers VIEW RELATED INFORMATION
- Microwave Infrared OI SST Product Description VIEW RELATED INFORMATION
- Documentation on the GDS version 2 format specification VIEW RELATED INFORMATION
- GHRSST Information VIEW RELATED INFORMATION
- Browse and download granules over HTTPS using the virtual directories GET DATA
- Browse granule search results in Earthdata Search GET DATA