MODIS/TERRA MOD44W Land Water Mask Derived from MODIS and SRTM L3 Global 250m SIN Grid

Land Water Mask Derived from MODIS and SRTM L3 Global 250m SIN Grid MOD44W
The new MODIS 250 m land-water mask (Short Name: MOD44W) is an improvement over the existing MODIS Nadir Bidirectional Reflectance Distribution Function (BRDF)-Adjusted Reflectance (NBAR) and MODIS land cover-based global land-water mask (Salomon et al., 2004). The MODIS NBAR and land cover based mask was itself an improved version of the EOS DEM-based land-water mask (Logan et al., 1999). The new MODIS 250 m mask is primarily created with three different data inputs: The Shuttle Radar Topography Mission's (SRTM) Water Body Dataset (SWBD) (Areas between 60? S to 60 N);
The MOD44C, a non-public, 250 m global 16-day composite collection based on 8+ years of Terra MODIS data, and 6+ years of Aqua MODIS data. This data set originally provided the input to produce the Vegetative Cover Conversion, and Vegetative Continuous Fields products (Areas between 60 N to 90 N); and the MODIS based Mosaic of Antarctica (MOA), which is a 250 m MODIS level-1b mosaic for Antarctica (Areas within Antarctica between 60 S and 90 S). Other appropriate and publicly available data sets were also used to supplement the production of the MODIS 250 m land water mask. Additional details regarding the methodology are available in the User Guide.
This marks the first time that such a global MODIS-SRTM land-water mask is offered publicly to end-users. This data set is provided in the same gridded tile structure that is common to several higher-level MODIS land products.