Abstract:
This data set is part of the Soil Moisture Experiment 2002 (SMEX02) project, which is associated with the Advanced Microwave Scanning Radiometer - Earth Observing System (AMSR-E) validation project. It consists of Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) and Normalized Difference Water Index (NDWI) data, derived from Landsat 5 Thematic Mapper (TM) and Landsat 7 Enhanced Thematic Mapper plus
... (ETM+) imagery. The satellite data were acquired during select dates in June and July 2002. These data cover the SMEX02 Walnut Creek watershed and the regional Iowa study areas in south-central Iowa, USA. Data are provided as flat binary files and are available via FTP. These data were collected as part of a validation study for the Advanced Microwave Scanning Radiometer - Earth Observing System (AMSR-E). AMSR-E is a mission instrument launched aboard NASA's Aqua Satellite on 04 May 2002. AMSR-E validation studies linked to SMEX are designed to evaluate the accuracy of AMSR-E soil moisture data. Specific validation objectives include assessing and refining soil moisture algorithm performance; verifying soil moisture estimation accuracy; investigating the effects of vegetation, surface temperature, topography, and soil texture on soil moisture accuracy; and determining the regions that are useful for AMSR-E soil moisture measurements. 
