Aura MLS

Derived CH4 Products

The methane (CH4) data files available on this website contain vertical profiles of atmospheric methane between 100 and 0.1 hPa pressure. These are derived using coincident measurements of atmospheric water vapor (H2O), carbon monoxide (CO), and nitrous oxide (N2O) from the EOS MLS (Earth Observing System Microwave Limb Sounder) instrument on the NASA Aura satellite.

Full details of the derivation are given in Minschwaner and Manney ("Derived Methane in the Stratosphere and Lower Mesosphere from Aura Microwave Limb Sounder Measurements of Nitrous Oxide, Water Vapor, and Carbon Monoxide", J. Atmos. Chem., 2015). Each file contains CH4 profiles for one day in a standard L2GP (Level 2 Geophysical Product), HDF-EOS (version 5) format, in a manner consistent with all of the standard EOS MLS data products. The naming convention also follows that of the other EOS MLS products,

MLS-Aura_L2GP-CH4_v<xx>-c<xx>_<yyyy><ddd>.he5

where <yyyy> is the year, and <ddd> is the day number in that year (001 = Jan 1). The version and cycle numbers, "v<xx>", "c<xx>", are variable depending on the day and year of each file. Currently the dataset contains methane profiles over the date range Aug 2004 through Aug 2013, and it will be updated as newer data are processed.

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