ASTER Global DEM

ASTER is capable of collecting in-track stereo using nadir- and aft-looking near infrared cameras. Since 2001, these stereo pairs have been used to produce single-scene (60- x 60-kilomenter (km)) digital elevation models (DEM) having vertical (root-mean-squared-error) accuracies generally between 10- and 25-meters (m).

The methodology used by Japan's Sensor Information Laboratory Corporation (SILC) to produce the ASTER GDEM involves automated processing of the entire ASTER Level-1A archive. Stereo-correlation is used to produce over one million individual scene-based ASTER DEMs, to which cloud masking is applied to remove cloudy pixels. All cloud-screened DEMS are stacked and residual bad values and outliers are removed. Selected data are averaged to create final pixel values, and residual anomalies are corrected before partitioning the data into 1 degree (°) x 1° tiles.

The ASTER GDEM covers land surfaces between 83°N and 83°S and is comprised of 22,702 tiles. Tiles that contain at least 0.01% land area are included. The ASTER GDEM is distributed as Geographic Tagged Image File Format (GeoTIFF) files with geographic coordinates (latitude, longitude). The data are posted on a 1 arc-second (approximately 30–m at the equator) grid and referenced to the 1984 World Geodetic System (WGS84)/ 1996 Earth Gravitational Model (EGM96) geoid.

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        earth-science
      
    
      
        land-surface
      
    
      
        national-geospatial...
      
    
      
        ngda
      
    
      
        surface-radiative-p...
      
    
      
        topography
      
    
  

  

  

  
    
  Additional Info
  
    
      
        Field
        Value
      
    
    
      
        

        

        
          
            Maintainer
            ANNIEPAT JOHNSON
          
        

        

        
        
          
            Last Updated
            
                

    July 17, 2025, 16:45 (UTC)

            
          
        
        
          
            Created

            
                

    March 31, 2025, 22:48 (UTC)

            
          
        

      
        
          
          
            accessLevel
            public
          
        
          
          
            bureauCode
            {026:00}
          
        
          
          
            catalog_@context
            https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema/catalog.jsonld
          
        
          
          
            catalog_@id
            https://data.nasa.gov/data.json
          
        
          
          
            catalog_conformsTo
            https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema
          
        
          
          
            catalog_describedBy
            https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema/catalog.json
          
        
          
          
            citation
            Archived by National Aeronautics and Space Administration, U.S. Government, DOI/USGS/EROS.
          
        
          
          
            harvest_object_id
            fb64a730-210f-4d9d-bbfc-a5ac6a3067b2
          
        
          
          
            harvest_source_id
            61638e72-b36c-4866-9d28-551a3062f158
          
        
          
          
            harvest_source_title
            DNG Legacy Data
          
        
          
          
            identifier
            C1220567908-USGS_LTA
          
        
          
          
            issued
            2019-09-20
          
        
          
          
            landingPage
            https://cmr.earthdata.nasa.gov:443/search/concepts/C1220567908-USGS_LTA.html
          
        
          
          
            language
            {en-US}
          
        
          
          
            metadata_type
            geospatial
          
        
          
          
            modified
            2019-03-25
          
        
          
          
            programCode
            {026:001}
          
        
          
          
            publisher
            DOI/USGS/EROS
          
        
          
          
            resource-type
            Dataset
          
        
          
          
            source_datajson_identifier
            true
          
        
          
          
            source_hash
            09e4c9d377d8d1603c7535b6ea5741ed80656aea7eceafd3de6af62c6bc76213
          
        
          
          
            source_schema_version
            1.1
          
        
          
          
            spatial
            -180.0 -90.0 180.0 90.0
          
        
          
          
            temporal
            1970-01-01T00:00:00Z/2022-01-17T00:00:00Z
          
        
          
          
            theme
            {geospatial}

Field	Value
Maintainer	ANNIEPAT JOHNSON
Last Updated	July 17, 2025, 16:45 (UTC)
Created	March 31, 2025, 22:48 (UTC)
accessLevel	public
bureauCode	{026:00}
catalog_@context	https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema/catalog.jsonld
catalog_@id	https://data.nasa.gov/data.json
catalog_conformsTo	https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema
catalog_describedBy	https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema/catalog.json
citation	Archived by National Aeronautics and Space Administration, U.S. Government, DOI/USGS/EROS.
harvest_object_id	fb64a730-210f-4d9d-bbfc-a5ac6a3067b2
harvest_source_id	61638e72-b36c-4866-9d28-551a3062f158
harvest_source_title	DNG Legacy Data
identifier	C1220567908-USGS_LTA
issued	2019-09-20
landingPage	https://cmr.earthdata.nasa.gov:443/search/concepts/C1220567908-USGS_LTA.html
language	{en-US}
metadata_type	geospatial
modified	2019-03-25
programCode	{026:001}
publisher	DOI/USGS/EROS
resource-type	Dataset
source_datajson_identifier	true
source_hash	09e4c9d377d8d1603c7535b6ea5741ed80656aea7eceafd3de6af62c6bc76213
source_schema_version	1.1
spatial	-180.0 -90.0 180.0 90.0
temporal	1970-01-01T00:00:00Z/2022-01-17T00:00:00Z
theme	{geospatial}