DOI: 10.17604/bswq-0119
title:  Ship-based high resolution sea surface skin temperature from the Marine-Atmospheric Emitted Radiance Interferometer (M-AERI) deployed between 2013 and 2020

description: This dataset is a part of that taken with sea-going instruments described by “Minnett, P.J., Knuteson, R.O., Best, F.A., Osborne, B.J., Hanafin, J.A., & Brown, O.B. (2001). The Marine-Atmospheric Emitted Radiance Interferometer (M-AERI), a high-accuracy, sea-going infrared spectroradiometer. Journal of Atmospheric and Oceanic Technology, 18, 994-1013". Specifically, this dataset comprises measurements of M-AERIs, ship-based Fourier Transform Infrared (FTIR) interferometric spectroradiometers mounted on ships a few meters (research ships) or a few tens of meters (cruise ships) above the sea surface. M-AERI spectra can be used to derive several geophysical variables, including accurate Skin Sea Surface Temperature (SSTskin) and near-surface air temperature (Minnett et al., 2005). M-AERI includes two infrared detectors and two internal blackbody cavities with SI-traceable calibration to perform real-time instrument calibration and achieve high-resolution spectra of the sea surface and atmospheric emitted infrared radiation. The scan mirror directs the field of view to include two internal blackbody calibration cavities to the sea surface and atmosphere. Before and after each deployment, the M-AERI calibration is tested using an external validation procedure in the University of Miami RSMAS laboratory using SI-traceable blackbody calibrator thus providing a calibration chain to standards at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) in the USA (Rice et al., 2004) and the National Physical Laboratory (NPL) in the UK (Theocharous et al., 2019). The absolute accuracy of the infrared spectra produced by the M-AERI is determined by the effectiveness of the black-body cavities as calibration targets. The absolute accuracy of the spectral measurements of the M-AERI is better than 0.03K, which is sufficiently small to give confidence in the use of such data in the validation of satellite SSTskin retrievals. The detailed technical description is given by Minnett et al. (2001), who describe the first generation of M-AERIs which have been replaced by newer models, but for which the measurement process and calibration remain the same.
description: This dataset is from 24 cruises; and the data from each cruise have been merged into a single netcdf file which contains near surface air temperature, sea surface temperature, measurement time, geolocation of the measurement, and other relevant parameters. Table 1 summarizes the time, coverage and which of the four M-AERIs units  used in each deployment.

Table 1. Details of the cruises (csv)
CRUISES,AREA,M-AERI UNIT,START,END,DAYS OF DATA
2013 Knorr,Atlantic Ocean,B,2013-02-13,2013-02-28,16
2013 RHB,North Atlantic Ocean,D,2013-11-11,2013-12-08,27
2014 Equinox,Caribbean Sea,A,2014-05-09,2014-06-20,42
2014 Allure,Caribbean Sea,C,2014-08-24,2014-12-31,130
2014 Equinox,Caribbean Sea,A,2014-11-16,2014-12-31,46
2015 Allure,"Caribbean Sea, North Atlantic Ocean, and Mediterranean Sea",C,2015-01-01,2015-11-29,360
2015 Equinox,Caribbean Sea,A,2015-01-01,2015-12-26,360
2015 Minerva Uno,Regional,A,2015-03-27,2015-04-13,17
2015 Alliance,North Atlantic Ocean,A,2015-11-17,2015-12-14,28
2016 Equinox,"Caribbean Sea, North Atlantic Ocean, and Mediterranean Sea",B,2016-01-02,2016-12-31,365
2016 RHB,Pacific,A,2016-11-07,2017-03-19,132
2017 Equinox,Caribbean Sea,B,2017-01-01,2017-12-31,365
2017 Allure,Caribbean Sea,C,2017-10-02,2017-11-26,56
2017 Minerva Uno,Regional,A,2017-05-25,2017-06-11,17
2018 Equinox,Caribbean Sea,B,2018-01-11,2018-09-23,255
2018 Adventure,Caribbean Sea and US East Coast,A,2018-02-12,2018-12-31,322
2018 Allure,Caribbean Sea,C,2018-02-18,2018-10-14,238
2018 RHB,Global,D,2018-03-07,2018-10-23,231
2019 Adventure,Caribbean Sea and US East Coast,A,2019-01-01,2019-10-30,302
2019 RHB PNE,North Atlantic Ocean,D,2019-02-24,2019-03-29,34
2019 RHB 2019 RHB UNOLS,US East Coast,D,2019-05-07,2019-05-31,24
2019 RHB JASON,US East Coast,D,2019-04-08,2019-04-30,22
2020 RHB,Leg 1 Caribbean Sea,D,2020-01-06,2020-02-13,38
2020 RHB,Leg 2 Caribbean Sea and Atlantic Ocean,D,2020-02-21,2020-04-17,57
Total,--,--,2013-02-13,2020-04-17,3484

Allure:  RCI Ship Allure of the Seas.
Equinox:  RCI Ship Celebrity Equinox.
Adventure:  RCI Ship Adventure of the Seas.
RHB: NOAA Ship Ronald H. Brown. 
Knorr:  Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution R/V Knorr
JASON:   NOAA ROV Jason team onboard Ship Ronald H. Brown.
Minerva Uno: Italy R/V Minerva Uno.
Alliance: North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) R/V Alliance.
PNE: PIRATA (Prediction and Research Moored Array in the Tropical Atlantic) -North East extension moorings
UNOLS: University-National Oceanographic Laboratory System

The data has been used for generating plots in the paper:
Luo, B., Minnett, P.J., Szczodrak, M., Kilpatrick, K., & Izaguirre, M. (2020). Validation of Sentinel-3A SLSTR derived Sea-Surface Skin Temperatures with those of the shipborne M-AERI. Remote Sensing of Environment, 244, 111826 doi: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.rse.2020.111826