This data product allows users to acquire time series of the distribution of UV-B radiation across the continental USA, based upon a fusion of measurements from the UVMRP and satellite-based estimates. Users will be able to use this data product to produce time series of UV-B at any location, and for characterizing the UV-B climate, in terms of basic statistics (eg. mean, min, max, std), geographic distributions, and temporal changes at daily, weekly, seasonal, and annual timescales. To provide this product, satellite data was used from the satellite-based Ozone Monitoring Instrument (OMI) that is made available on the NASA Mirador site to improve spatial interpolations based on UVMRP data. The new data set was then reformatted, and processed with a series of custom computer programs. Lastly, GIS and image processing software were used to produce derived data products and to carry out a variety of analyses and visualizations. Please see Using Remote Sensing Data to Improve Geographic Assessments of UV-B Radiation from a Sparse Ground Monitoring Network for more detailed information.
The data are weekly files for 2005-2014 of total daily UVB radiation (KJ/m2/day), averaged for each week. The primary value of the data are that they are more accurate in estimating UVB values for locations distant from UVMRP monitoring stations than the values that are estimated using traditional spatial interpolation. The data is provided in three formats:
- Terrset/IDRISI (rst and rdc, the rst files can also be treated as binary BIP files with a single band)
- Geotiff (tif)
- ARCASCII (asc, the ESRI format for importing gridded data)
Filename: uvb_day_year_wk_jd1-jd2.*
where year is the year, wk is the week of the year, and jd1 and jd2 are beginning and ending Julian dates for the week.
The following information describes the spatial parameters of the grids. They are in geographic (lat-lon) projection, with 1 degree resolution. They cover the co-terminus USA.
- columns : 61
- rows : 27
- ref. system : latlong
- ref. units : degrees
- min. X : -125.
- max. X : -64.
- min. Y : 24.0
- max. Y : 51.0
- resolution : 1.0