Comparison of SST L3 products generated from the AVHRR and MODIS sensors in front of the San Jorge Gulf, Argentina Comparación de los productos de TSM L3 generados a partir de los sensores AVHRR y MODIS frente al Golfo San Jorge, Argentina

Abstract

Since the early 1980s, the AVHRR sensor on board the NOAA satellites has provided SST estimates to the scientific community in general. Towards the end of the 1990s, a new generation of radiometers was added, combining a wider range of spectral measurements with improvements in technology, such as the MODIS sensor on board the Terra and Aqua satellites. The development of this last sensor was based on the years of NOAA/AVHRR series. Understanding the relationship between products derived from different sensors is critical to the continuous long-term monitoring of any variable and the construction of continuous time series. The objective of this work was to make a comparison of the monthly SST values for the 2003-2006 period calculated from data from the NOAA/AVHRR series versus Aqua-MODIS on a sector of the middle Argentina Continental shelf off the San Jorge Gulf. For both sensors, the isotherms show a similar distribution pattern in all months. Pearson’s correlation coefficient was high, both in the seasonal (> 0.9) and monthly (> 0.8) analyzes. The comparative analysis of the temperature estimated by both sensors shows that SST products are similar and can be used to analyze large and continuous time series.