On May 20, 2008, a deck of clouds over the Pacific Ocean provided an optical display for the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA’s Aqua satellite. The ring-shaped, rainbow-like phenomenon, known as a glory, appears through the length of the left of this image.

The most obvious ring is about 60 kilometers wide in its [...]

Envisat MERIS sensor captures sand and dust from the Sahara Desert blowing across the Atlantic Ocean along the coasts of Mauritania (top), Senegal (middle) and Guinea Bissau (bottom). The cloud-covered Cape Verde islands are visible off the coast of Senegal. The Medium Resolution Imaging Spectrometer (MERIS) is a imaging spectrometer that measures the solar radia [...]

Aerosols are a fundamental component of the Earth's atmospheric chemistry and radiative balance. Their importance in atmospheric radiative transfer means that the lack of accurate information on their distribution is a major limitation for weather forecasting. Aerosol distribution is also essential information in the study of the Earth's climate and biogeochemical cycles, for climate%2 [...]

The SEVIRI sensor is on board Meteosat 8 (formerly called Meteosat Second Generation) in a geostationary orbit 35,800 km above the equator, just off the West coast of Africa. The spinning of the spacecraft and a North-South scan mirror provides an image of the globe every 15 minutes. The instrument provides a sub-satellite resolution of 3x3 km in 3 visible and 8 [...]

This image is an example of global composite of MCI (Maximum Chlorophyll Index) for the month of July 2006 where a major bloom event in the southern Baltic can be seen at the upper centre. This index shows the amplitude of a peak near 705 nm in the radiance spectrum of light reflected from the earth’s surface, which has been associated with high levels of c [...]

This animation is comprised of Envisat ASAR mosaics of the Arctic Ocean for 2005, 2006 and 2007 and highlights the changes in sea ice. The ice-free areas appear as dark gray and the sea ice areas as light gray. The area covered by sea ice in the Arctic has shrunk to its lowest level this week since satellite measurements began nearly 30 years ago, opening up [...]

The ENVISAT MERIS (Medium Resolution Imaging Spectrometer Instrument) Global Vegetation Index (MGVI) was designed to assess and monitor the state and health of terrestrial vegetation using MERIS measurements acquired in space (at the so-called 'top of atmosphere'). Using the blue, red and near-infrared spectral bands of MERIS, as well as information on the angula [...]

Using the Advanced Synthetic Aperture Radar (ASAR) sensor onboard the ENVISAT satellite in its Global Monitoring Mode products the European Space Agency Grid Processing on-Demand (G-POD) - http://eogrid.esrin.esa.int - creates in a daily basis mosaics of Antarctic Continent. Working in this mode mode, the ASAR instr [...]

Using spectral bands 2, 3, 5 and 7 from the ENVISAT MERIS Reduced Resolution level 2 products the European Space Agency Grid Processing on-Demand (G-POD) - http://eogrid.esrin.esa.int - automatically creates in a daily, monthly and seasonal basis, global Earth maps. With a spatial resolution of 1 minute [...]