The Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS): land remote sensing for global change research

TLDR

MODIS, scheduled for launch in 1998, will become fully effective once a stable, well‑calibrated multispectral time‑series is established. This paper outlines the proposed MODIS standard products for land applications and the plans for data quality assessment and validation. The authors describe the design of these standard products and the procedures for quality assessment and validation. MODIS will provide enhanced terrestrial remote‑sensing capabilities, offering new standard and higher‑order products that reduce processing burdens, enable near‑daily moderate‑resolution land monitoring, and complement Landsat 7’s high‑resolution sampling for powerful global‑to‑regional observations.

Abstract

The first Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) instrument is planned for launch by NASA in 1998. This instrument will provide a new and improved capability for terrestrial satellite remote sensing aimed at meeting the needs of global change research. The MODIS standard products will provide new and improved tools for moderate resolution land surface monitoring. These higher order data products have been designed to remove the burden of certain common types of data processing from the user community and meet the more general needs of global-to-regional monitoring, modeling, and assessment. The near-daily coverage of moderate resolution data from MODIS, coupled with the planned increase in high-resolution sampling from Landsat 7, will provide a powerful combination of observations. The full potential of MODIS will be realized once a stable and well-calibrated time-series of multispectral data has been established. In this paper the proposed MODIS standard products for land applications are described along with the current plans for data quality assessment and product validation.