Aquarius/Satélite de Aplicaciones Científicas-D (Aquarius/SAC-D) Mission

Aquarius/Satélite de Aplicaciones Científicas-D (Aquarius/SAC-D) Aquarius/Satélite de Aplicaciones Científicas-D (Aquarius/SAC-D) AboutMission ObjectivesThe Aquarius/SAC-D satellite Aquarius/SAC-D mission, launched on 10 June 2011, was a joint venture between NASA and the Argentinean Space Agency (CONAE). The mission featured the sea surface salinity sensor Aquarius and was the first mission with the primary goal of measuring sea surface salinity (SSS) from space. Data from Aquarius played a large role in understanding both climate change and the global water cycle. This instrument carried 3 radiometers and 1 scatterometer operating at 1.4 GHz & 1.2 GHz, respectively. The data collected by the radiometer were used together with sea surface temperature collected from another platform(s) to derive salinity data, and corrected for surface roughness using data from the Aquarius scatterometer. On 7 June 2015 at 12:53:17 UTC the Aquarius/SAC-D observatory suffered a mission-ending hardware failure resulting in the permanent cessation of data flows. The entire Aquarius data record spans a full 3 year, 9 month period from 25 August 2011 to 7 June 2015.Instruments

Radiometer – Three L-band microwave polarimetric radiometers to measure the brightness temperature of microwave emissions from the ocean surface with a center frequency of 1.413 GHz.
Scatterometer – L-band, polarimetric scatterometer provides information to correct for ocean surface roughhness and shares the antenna with the radiometers. It has a 373 km wide swath, transmits in a protected 1260 MHz frequency, has a 4 MHz band width, and makes 5.6 measurements per second in vertical and horizontal polarizations.

Documentation

For all Aquarius technical documents, listed by version, and including the final Version 5.0, click HERE.

Aquarius V5.0 Data Users Guide (.pdf) [doi:10.5067/DOCUM-AQR01]
Aquarius V5.0 Summary of Improvements (.pdf)
L1A Data Specification (.pdf)
L2 V5.0 Data format description (.pdf)
L3 V5.0 Data format description (.pdf)
Aquarius V5.0 Salinity data validation analysis (.pdf) [doi:10.5067/DOCUM-AQR02]
Aquarius Mission Summary (.pdf) - in preparation
Aquarius Flags & Masks (.pdf)
Aquarius ATBD end-of-mission (.pdf) and Supplements (.txt/zip) [doi:10.5067/DOCUM-AQR04]
L2-ATBD (Algorithm Theoretical Basis Document) (.pdf)
L2-ATBD Addendum 1 (.pdf)
L2-ATBD Addendum 2 (.pdf)
L2-ATBD Addendum 3 - includes V3.0 algorithm, APC & calibration updates (.pdf)
L2-ATBD Addendum 4 - includes V4.0 algorithm updates (.pdf)
L2-ATBD Addendum 5 - includes V5.0 algorithm updates (.pdf)
Aquarius Counts to TA ATBD (.pdf) [doi:10.5067/DOCUM-AQR08]
Aquarius L2 to L3 ATBD (.pdf) [doi:10.5067/DOCUM-AQR05]
Aquarius Salinity Uncertainty estimation (.pdf)
Aquarius-Derived Sea Surface Density estimation (.pdf)
Performance Degradation & QC Flagging of Aquarius L2 SSS Retrieval (.pdf) [doi:10.5067/DOCUM-AQR06]
APC update memo (.pdf)
Radar ATBD and Radar RFI algorithm (.pdf)
Radiometer calibration methodology with RFI algorithm description (.pdf)
Radiometer Whole Range Calibration V5.0 (.pdf)
Pointing correction analysis (.pdf)
Radar calibration report (.pdf) [doi:10.5067/DOCUM-AQR07]
L3 smoothing algorithm description (.pdf)
Aquarius AVDS Data Validation technical memo (.pdf) [doi:10.5067/DOCUM-AQR03]
Aquarius Celestial Sky Emission product Guide & Publication

Note: All Aquarius technical documents, including for prior versions, are available here.

Known Issues

Aquarius Data Issues

PO.DAAC

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