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Climatology Interdiscipline Data Collection
Volumes 1-4
Monthly Means for Climate Studies
H.L. Kyle (1), J.M. McManus (1,3), S. Ahmad (1,2), P.L. Hrubiak (1,2),
M. Kafatos (3), R. Yang (3) Z. Li (3)
(1) Goddard Distributed Active Archive Center, NASA Goddard Space Flight
Center
(2) Ratheon-STX Corporation
(3) Institute for Computational Sciences and Informatics (CSI), Center for
Earth Observing and Space Research (CEOSR), George Mason University
Table of Contents page
Introduction ---------------------------------- 1
What You'll Find On Each CD ------------------ 2
-- Volume 1 ---------------------------------- 2
-- Volume 2 ---------------------------------- 3
-- Volume 3 ----------------------------------- 3
-- Volume 4 ---------------------------------- 4
Technical Information-------------------------- 4
-- Web Browser Management of CDs -------------- 4
-- Formats ------------------------------------ 4
-- Software Directories ----------------------- 4
-- Discussion of Software --------------------- 4
----- Decompression software ------------------ 5
----- Read programs --------------------------- 5
----- Analysis Software (GrADS) --------------- 5
Acknowledgments ------------------------------- 5
Introduction
The Goddard Distributive Active Archive Center (GDAAC) compiled the Climatology
Interdiscipline Data Collection (CIDC) to facilitate interdisciplinary studies
related to climate and global change. The CD-ROM version has been produced in
collaboration with the Center for Earth Observing and Space Research (CEOSR),
Institute for Computational Sciences and Informatics (CSI), George Mason
University. It was designed for global change, seasonal to interannual climate
studies and other phenomena requiring from one to dozens of interacting
parameters.
A few of the possible study areas are: the depletion of stratospheric ozone,
the weather changes associated with the periodic El Nino Southern Oscillation
(ENSO) events, periodic droughts, and global warming. Short, background
information scenarios are given on The CD for the Monsoon, El Nino and Global
Warming phenomena.
The CD set also contains software to read the data and the Grid Analysis and
Display System, GrADS (copyright 1988-1996 by Brian Doty). If desired the CDs
can be opened with a Web Browser. A general description of the set's contents
and structure is given in this booklet, but a more detailed version is given
in the AAREADME (introductory) document on each CD.
Data from scientific disciplines dealing with meteorology & atmospheric
sciences, land surface, ocean, cryosphere, biosphere, the Sun and remote
sensing science have been gathered into one place and, where feasible,
presented in a common format (monthly means with a 1x1 degree world grid, or
commensurable, resolution and IEEE 32-bit floating point numbers). Over 70
physical parameters from some 25 separate data sets are represented. The Data
Collection Overview document on the CD lists all the physical parameters
alphabetically together with the data set(s) in which they can be found. It
also contains a separate listing of each data set, its origin and the parameters
included. Each data set is also accompanied by a detailed user's guide.
The CIDC data collection was originally set up on an Internet site in the fall
of 1995. Since then the number of included parameters and the temporal
coverage of the individual data sets have grown considerably. We made this
CD-ROM version in response to numerous requests. Because this is a dynamic data
collection, with additional years of data added as they are prepared and new
versions of particular periodically issued, be sure to refer to the Website
from time to time for the most up-to-date materials. Go to
http://daac.gsfc.nasa.gov/CAMPAIGN_DOCS/FTP_SITE/inter_disc.html
Alternately
http://daac.gsfc.nasa.gov/
(click on Interdisciplinary under DISCIPLINE SPECIFIC INFORMATION)
These CDs can be accessed directly, but they are better managed through a Web
browser. Call up the browser then go to open file and select the CD. In this
mode the user can jump directly from the CD to the Internet if the Internet
connection is open. The CD HTML pages contain several Web links that include
links to both K-12 and university level educational sites.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
What You'll Find On Each CD
In addition to data each CD has a section containing documentation, the three
climate scenarios and software. AAREADME, an introductory document, gives a
brief description of the CD contents, along with layout, data format and other
useful information. The documentation folder contains Readme User's Guides for
each data set. The software folder contains programs to read the binary data
and the GrADS analysis program. The read programs have the capability of
writing the binary data out as an ASCII files. When activated the GrADS
program can be used to both view and analyze the data.
Volume 1: Biosphere, Hydrology, Surface Temperature, Ozone, Greenhouse Gases
The Biosphere (land and ocean)
-- Ocean pigment concentration (CZCS): 7.5 years (11/1978-6/1986) of monthly
means, a 12-month mean climatology and a 7.5 year mean climatology
-- Normalized Vegetation Index, AVHRR NDVI (7/1981-9/1994)
-- Land cover classifications (ISLSCP) as determined for the year 1987
Measured variable atmospheric constituents
-- Total ozone from the Total Ozone Mapping Spectrometer (TOMS; 11/78-5/93)
-- Greenhouse gases (1994-160,000 years b.p.) CO2, CH4, N2O.
Measured surface temperatures & pressures
-- Sea surface temperatures , anomalies and monthly climatologies, NOAA/NCEP
(11/81- 7/97).
-- Temperature deviations derived by U. East Anglia (1851-1996).
-- GISS global mean temperature anomalies (1/1866-9/1997).
-- Southern oscillation index ; The normalized difference in the Darwin and
Tahiti surface pressures. (East Anglia; 1/1866 -12/1994).
Hydrological data
-- Total atmospheric precipitable water (water vapor) from SSM/I (8/87-11/91).
-- Global Precipitation Gauge Analysis (1986-6/97)
-- Global Combined Precipitation, satellite and gauge analysis for land and
ocean (7/87-11/87, 1/88-9/97).
-- Monsoon rain data, SMMR (10/78-8/87).
-- Sea ice concentration SMMR/SMMI (10/78-12/96).
-- Soil Characteristics: texture, depth, slope, and type (FAO).
Angular Radiation Distribution Models (from ERBE) for top of the atmosphere
broad spectral band shortwave reflectance and longwave emission.
Documentation and Software Folders
------------------------------------------
CD-ROM Vol. 2 Atmospheric Dynamics
4-dimensional Atmospheric dynamics products from the Goddard Data Assimilation
Office ( 3/1980-11/1993). A 26 parameter subset: winds, geopotential height,
temperature, specific humidity (all at 8 pressure levels), also total
precipitation, long- and short-wave radiation, total cloud cover, surface
conditions, etc. Unlike most of the other data, these products are on a 2 x 2
degree world grid. This data has been compressed using gzip. It needs to be
unzipped before use. However a few sample uncompressed files are available
for initial examination.
-----------------------
Documentation and Software folders..
----------------------------------------------
CD-ROM Vol. 3 (Radiation and Clouds)
Cloud Physical Characteristics and Fractions
as monitored by the International Satellite Cloud Climatology Project (ISCCP).
These products were produced by the NASA/Goddard Institute for Space Studies
(GISS).
-- Clouds, ISCCP C2 products (7/1983-6/1991). A 6 parameter subset: mean
diurnal cloud fraction, cloud top pressure and temperature, mean daytime
cloud optical thickness, clear sky surface reflectance and temperature.
-- Clouds, ISCCP D2 (new version) products (1/86-1/87, 1/89-12/93). (This
data is compressed) A 36 parameter subset: the 6 parameters mentioned
above, low, mid & high altitude cloud fractions, 9 daytime cloud types
with ice and water cloud differentiation, etc. This data set has been
compressed using gzip. It must be unzipped before use. A few sample un
compressed files are available for initial examination.
Radiation
-- Earth's Radiation Budget Experiment (ERBE): longwave at the top of the
atmosphere (1986-1988).
-- Solar irradiance: total (Nimbus-7 ERB, ACRIM I & II, ERBS daily and monthly
means; (11/78-12/97).
-- Surface Solar Irradiance from NASA/GISS (7/83-6/91) Downward solar
irradiance at the surface.
-- Surface Radiation Budget from NASA/Langley Research Center (7/83-6/91):
Clear-sky downward SW & LW flux, all-sky downward SW & LW flux, and
net SW & LW flux.
----------------------------------
Documentation and software folders. Decompression software is provided.
--------------------------------------------------
CD-ROM Vol. 4 Atmospheric Soundings
Goddard TOVS Pathfinder A atmospheric sounding products. This 11 parameter
subset includes surface pressure, temperature, precipitation, and mean layer
temperature, precipitable water, and cloud fraction for specified pressure
levels (1985-92). The data is compressed and must be decompressed (unzipped)
before use. Sample uncompressed files are provided for initial examination.
-----------------------------
Documentation and Software folders:.
Because of the lack of space on Volume IV, the animations are not included in
the El Nino and Monsoon climate scenarios and only three of the GrADS analysis
software versions are included. If desired other versions can be down loaded
from one of the other volumes.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Technical Information
Browser Management of CD
The CD can be accessed directly, but it can be best managed through a Web
browser such as Netscape. Call up the browser then go to open file and select
the CD. The CDs have links to internet sites which can be used if the browser
is connected to the Internet. A Web browser is particularly useful in
accessing certain CD items such as the climate scenarios. A browser is not
required to access the data files or the text versions of the User's Guides.
Formats
Most of the data is presented in floating point, IEEE 4-byte flat binary format
written on a Big Endian SGI machine with a UNIX environment. This means that
for Little Endian Machines (PCs, VAX, and DEC Alpha) the bytes have to be
swapped., This is discussed further under Software. Some small data sets are
given as ASCII tables. Read software is supplied to read the floating point
binary files. If desired, it is capable of writing the binary data out in ASCII
files.
The file names are up to 32 characters long, and contain data product, parameter
name, spatial and temporal resolution and coverage, year, month and file type
information. DOS can only handle file names up to eight characters in length.
PC machines without Windows will truncate the file names to the first eight
characters. PC Windows systems will retain all 32 characters, but treat the
last 24 characters as a comment statement. Most of the data is given in the
form of monthly means on a 1-degree by 1-degree global grid., but larger grid
squares (2x2 up to 5x5 degrees) are used in some of our data sets. This
depends on the wishes of the data producers. Each data set is accompanied by
a Readme User's Guide which gives detailed information on the development of
the data set, the individual file names, the display grid and so forth .
Software Directories
Each CIDC CD-ROM contains a software directory with subdirectories as follows:
-- aareadme A document that describes the content of the software directory.
-- decompression/Directory that contains decompression software for different
platforms. Refer to the Decompression Software aareadme for further details
UNIX versions of gunzip have not been supplied since most UNIX operating
systems already have this software. If you are running UNIX and don't have
gunzip, you can get it at the following URL:
http://www.pe.utexas.edu/Archive_Tools/archive.html
--grads/ Directory that contains Grid Analysis and Display System software.
The Grid Analysis and Display System (GrADS) is an interactive desktop tool
that is currently in use worldwide for the analysis and display of earth
science data. GrADS was developed by Brian Doty at the Institute of Global
Environment and Society, Center for Ocean-Land-Atmosphere. On this CD-ROM we
have supplied versions for most UNIX workstations, Apple Macintosh, Linux
based PCs, MSDOS and Windows 95/NT PCs. GrADS is also freely available via
the www, where additional versions are available as well as future updates
to the software on this CD-ROM. GrADS provides an integrated environment
for access, manipulation, and display of earth science data. For UNIX and
Linux systems we have supplied a point and click interface (gui) with the
necessary files to read and display the data automatically. The GrADS
software package enables the user to read the data, byte swap for PCs and
other little endian machines, and then carry out many analysis steps. For
x86 PCs running 32-bit MS Windows operating System (win95 and winNT) we
supple Win32 GrADS which is an adapted form of Brian Doty's UNIX version of
GrADS. It requires an X-Window server to run. If you don't already have an
X-Window server, on your PC, you can use the demonstration X-Window (xdemo32)
server supplied with this CD set. See the aareadme in the grads directory for
more information. In addition links are given to the GrADS Internet home
page and other useful sites.
--xwin/ Directory that contains a demonstration version of the Xwin32 X Server
--readdata/Directory: FORTRAN, IDL, and C programs are given to read the
binary data. The computer code is given for each program with instructions
for use on several types of computers. Compiled (FORTRAN) executable
modules are also provided for several different platforms (PCs, Macs, DEC
Alpha, VAX, SGI, SUN and HP). The executable allows the user to promptly
view the binary data at selected grids or subset the data for the specified
regions of interest. It also allows the user to write the selected binary
data into ASCII files. These executables will run on PCs and other
platforms that lack FORTRAN software. Additional information is given in
the directory document.
NOTE: The CIDC 4 CD-ROM GrADS directory contains only the SGI Irix-5, Sun OS
4.1 and the WIN32 for Windows 95/NT GrADS versions because of lack of space.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Acknowledgments:
The production of this CD set was sponsored by NASA's Earth Science enterprise.
We acknowledge and thank the many scientists and science teams who produced the
25 climate data sets summarized in this collection. Each data set is
accompanied by a Readme User's Guide which mentions the principle scientists
involved and lists several pertinent references. We thank Brian Doty for
permission to include the: Grid Analysis and Display System (GrADS ) Copyright
⌐ 1988-1996 by Brian Doty, Center for Ocean-Land-Atmosphere Studies (COLA),
Institute of Global Environment and Society, Calverton, MD. All Rights Reserved.
We also thank Arlindo da Silva for GrADS modification discussions and assistance
with the GrADS software that we placed on this CD s