VIIRS/SNPP Dark Target Aerosol L2 6-Min Swath 6km

The SNPP/VIIRS L2 Dark Target Aerosol 6-Min L2 Swath 6 km product, short-name XAERDT_L2_VIIRS_SNPP is provided at 6-km spatial resolution (at-nadir) and a 6-minute cadence that typically yields about 130 granules over the daylit hours of a 24-hour period. The SNPP/VIIRS L2 collection record spans from January 2019 through December 2022.

The XAERDT_L2_VIIRS_SNPP product is a part of the Geostationary Earth Orbit (GEO)–Low-Earth Orbit (LEO) Dark Target Aerosol project under NASA’s Making Earth System Data Records for Use in Research Environments (MEaSUREs) program, led by Robert Levy, uses a special version of the MODIS Dark Target (DT) aerosol retrieval algorithm to produce Aerosol Optical Depth (AOD) and other aerosol parameters derived independently from seven sensor/platform combinations, where 3 are in GEO and 4 are in LEO. The 3 GEO sensors include Advanced Baseline Imagers (ABI) on both GOES-16 (GOES-East) and GOES-17 (GOES-West), and Advanced Himawari Imager (AHI) on Himawari-8. The 4 LEO sensors include MODIS on both Terra and Aqua, and VIIRS on both Suomi-NPP and NOAA-20. Adding the LEO sensors reinforces a major goal of this project, which is to render a consistent science maturity level across DT aerosol products derived from both types and sources of orbital satellites.

The XAERDT_L2_VIIRS_SNPP product, in netCDF4 format, contains 45 Science Data Set (SDS) layers that include 8 geolocation and 37 geophysical SDSs.

For more information consult LAADS [product description page](https://ladsweb.modaps.eosdis.nasa.gov/missions-and-measurements/products/XAERDT_L2_VIIRS_SNPP) or [Dark Target aerosol team page](https://darktarget.gsfc.nasa.gov/).