ERS-2 Gridded Level 3 Enhanced Resolution Sigma-0 from BYU

This European Remote Sensing (ERS) Sigma-0 dataset is generated by the Scatterometer Climate Record Pathfinder (SCP) project at Brigham Young University (BYU) and is generated using a Scatterometer Image Reconstruction (SIR) technique developed by Dr. David Long at BYU. The dataset provides SIR processed Sigma-0 data from the ERS-2 C-band scatterometer, which is also known as the Active Microwave Instrument (AMI). AMI is a multimode radar operating at a frequency of 5.3 GHz (C-band), using vertically polarized antennas for both transmission and reception. The SIR technique results in an enhanced resolution image reconstruction and gridded on an equal-area grid (for non-polar regions) at 8.9 km pixel resolution stored in SIR files; polar regions are gridded at the same resolution using a polar-stereographic technique. A non-enhanced version is provided at 44.5 km pixel resolution in a format known as GRD (i.e., gridded) files. All files are produced in IEEE formatted binary. All data files are separated and organized by region, parameter, and sampling technique (i.e., SIR vs. GRD). The regions of China and Japan are combined into a single region. In addition to Sigma-0, various statistical parameters are provided for added guidance, including but not limited to: standard deviation, measurement counts, pixel time, Sigma-0 error, and average incidence angle. This dataset was once distributed on tape, but has been made available on FTP thanks to the BYU SCP. For more information, please visit: http://www.scp.byu.edu/docs/ERS_user_notes.html

Data and Resources

Additional Info

Field Value
Maintainer Earthdata Forum
Last Updated September 15, 2026, 05:50 (UTC)
Created April 1, 2025, 15:39 (UTC)
accessLevel public
bureauCode {026:00}
catalog_conformsTo https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema
harvest_object_id a697932b-6285-40f7-895f-c8a0b0108831
harvest_source_id b99e41c6-fe79-4c19-bbc3-9b6c8111bfac
harvest_source_title Science Discovery Engine
identifier 10.5067/ERS2B-SNEN0
license https://www.usa.gov/government-works
modified 2026-09-07T22:16:04Z
programCode {026:000}
publisher BYU/CRS/SCP;NASA/JPL/PODAAC
resource-type Dataset
source_datajson_identifier true
source_hash 77e5c389959da0dad8a10fa72778f0d18c52ead6a59f754cdc1ea130f45252ee
source_schema_version 1.1
spatial ["CARTESIAN", [{"EastBoundingCoordinate": 180.0, "NorthBoundingCoordinate": 88.2, "SouthBoundingCoordinate": -79.7, "WestBoundingCoordinate": -180.0}]]
temporal 1996-06-03/2001-12-30
theme {"Earth Science"}