TMISST (Ver. 1.0),
February, 1999
October, 2003, revised
May, 2006, revised

1. Description

This document describes the data set for Sea Surface

Temperature (SST) observed by the TRMM Microwave Imager (TMI)

aboard the Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission (TRMM).

The SST was retrieved from TRMM/TMI Level 1 (1B11) standard

products.

'TMISST (Ver. 1.0)' was produced and supplied by the Earth Observation Research Center, Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency.

2. Directories and files

1) Browse images (gif format)

You can get three-day running mean (daily) and monthly mean SST browse images from the following URL:

Japanese
http://www.eorc.jaxa.jp/TRMM/imgdt/day_tmi2/index_j.htm

English
http://www.eorc.jaxa.jp/TRMM/imgdt/day_tmi2/

The rule for naming browse images is as follows:

For SSTGlobal map (monthly)tst_glYYYYMM.gif
Global map (daily)tst_glYYYYMMDD.gif
Equatorial Pacific (daily)tst_eqYYYYMMDD.gif
South of Japan (daily)tst_jpYYYYMMDD.gif
YYYY: year (I4.4)
MM: month (I2.2)
DD: day (I2.2)

*NOTE; that the three-day running mean image is calculated from one-day mean data, and the date of the filename for daily image is defined as the middle day of the three-day average.

2) Data (binary)

You can get one-day mean and monthly mean data from the following anonymous FTP sites:

For SST @

3. Format of the data set

1) Data format

1-byte binary
matrix size: 1440 (LON) x 305 (LAT)

2) Coverage

0.125W --> Eastward --> 0.125W
38.125N --> Southward --> 38.125S

Item (1,1) stores the value centered at 0.0E and 38.0N
Item (1440,305) stores the value centered at 0.25W and 38.0S.

3) Resolution

Horizontal
0.25 deg (LON) x 0.25 deg (LAT)

Temporal
Daily and Monthly

4) Missing values

255

5) Conversion

You can calculate the real SST [C] from COUNT using the following relationship:

SST [C] = COUNT/10.0 + 10.0

*NOTE that SST values less than 10 [C] and exceeding 35.4 were defined as missing values.

4. Example program for F77


c
c	TO READ TMI DAILY MEAN SST 	
c

       parameter (idim = 1440, jdim = 305)
       parameter (imiss = 255, rmiss = -999.0)
       real*4 sst(idim,jdim)
       character*1 csst(idim,jdim)
       integer*2 isst
       character c1(2)*1, c2*2
       equivalence (c1,c2)

  101  format (a2)

c	OPEN DATA FILE

       open(10,file='tmi_1day.19990101', access='direct',
     2    form='unformatted', status='old', recl=idim*jdim, err=99)

c	READ COUNT DATA

       read(10,rec=1) csst

c	CONVERT COUNT TO SST

       do 100 i = 1, idim

	do 110 j = 1, jdim

	   c1(2) = csst(i,j)

           read(c2,101) isst

	   if (isst.eq.imiss) then

c	MISSING

             xsst(i,j) = rmiss

	   else

	     xsst(i,j) = real(isst)/10.0 + 10.0

	   endif

  110   continue

  100  continue

c	CLOSE

   99  close(10)

c	STOP
       stop    

   end

5. Display using GrADS

The Data is written in GrADS "non float data" format.

The Grid Analysis and Display System (GrADS) is an interactive desktop tool, which is available on almost UNIX workstations, Apple Macintosh, and DOS or Linux based PCs. You can get free GrADS software via anonymous ftp.

The URL of GrADS Home Page is:
http://grads.iges.org/grads/head.html

You can easily display 'TMISST (Ver. 1.0)' using the GrADS descriptor file:

Example for SST

        
    DSET  tmi_1day.19990101
	TITLE TMI SST
	OPTIONS yrev
	UNDEF 255
	XDEF  1440 LINEAR  0. 0.25
	YDEF  305  LINEAR -38. 0.25
	ZDEF  1 LEVELS 1000
	TDEF  1 LINEAR 1jan1999 1dy
	VARS  1
	t1    0  -1,40,1   sst=t1/10+10
	ENDVARS

For more information about GrADS, please read the GrADS documentation located on the GrADS Home Page.

6. References

Shibata, A., Imaoka, K., Kachi, M., and Murakami, H. (1999):
Perspective of Researches using TRMM Microwave Imager.
Journal of Remote Sensing Society of Japan, 18, 52-61. (In Japanese)

Shibata, A., Imaoka, K., Kachi, M., and Murakami, H. (1999):
SST observation by TRMM Microwave Imager aboard Tropical Rainfall 
Measuring Mission. Umi no Kenkyu, 8, 135-139. (In Japanese)

7. Notice

1) If you want to use TMISST browse images in publications, please contact the EORC TRMM Office ( ).

2) If you use TMISST data in publications, please include the following credits:

"'TMISST (Ver. 1.0)' was produced and supplied by the Earth Observation Research Center, Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency."

Also, we would appreciate receiving a preprint and/or reprint of those publications utilizing TMISST data for inclusion in the TRMM bibliography. These publications should be sent to: 

The EORC TRMM Office
Earth Observation Research Center
Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency
22nd Floor Office Tower X, Harumi Triton Square,
1-8-10, Harumi, Chuo-ku, Tokyo 104-6023, JAPAN

FAX: +81-3-6221-9192

3) Please contact us for any comments, problems or questions at e-mail address:


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