Skip to main content

Description

The Earth Surface Mineral Dust Source Investigation (EMIT) instrument measures surface mineralogy, targeting the Earth’s arid dust source regions. EMIT is installed on the International Space Station (ISS). EMIT uses imaging spectroscopy to take mineralogical measurements of the sunlit regions of interest between 52° N latitude and 52° S latitude. An interactive map showing the regions being investigated, current and forecasted data coverage, and additional data resources can be found on the VSWIR Imaging Spectroscopy Interface for Open Science (VISIONS): EMIT Open Data Portal.

The EMIT Level 1B Corrected Spacecraft Attitude and Ephemeris (EMITL1BATT) Version 1 data product provides both corrected and uncorrected attitude quaternions and spacecraft ephemeris data obtained from the ISS, including Earth-centered inertial (ECI) position and velocity, and associated time elements. The data are provided in 1 second intervals, and each product file contains vectors from the duration of the orbit. The time elements are copied from the ISS raw data. The data for each EMITL1BATT granule are delivered in a single Network Common Data Format 4 (netCDF-4) file.

Known Issues

  • Data acquisition gap: From September 13, 2022, through January 6, 2023, a power issue outside of EMIT caused a pause in operations. Due to this shutdown, no data were acquired during that timeframe.

Version Description

Version 1

Product Summary

Platforms
ISS
Instruments
EMIT Imaging Spectrometer
Spatial Extent
N: 54 S: -54 E: 180 W: -180
Geographic Region
GLOBAL LAND
Coordinate System
CARTESIAN
Granule Spatial Representation
NO_SPATIAL
Temporal Extent
2022-08-09 to Present
Temporal Resolution
Varies
Data Partner
Land Processes Distributed Active Archive Center (LP DAAC)
Earth Surface Mineral Dust Source Investigation, Jet Propulsion Laboratory, NASA (NASA/JPL/EMIT)
Concept ID
C2408031090-LPCLOUD
Data State
ACTIVE
Processing Level
1B
Published
Updated
Science Keywords
Attitude Characteristics,
Viewing Geometry

Citation

Citation is critically important for dataset documentation and discovery. This dataset is openly shared, without restriction, in accordance with the EOSDIS Data Use and Citation Guidance.

Copy Citation

Green, R. (2023). EMIT L1B Corrected Spacecraft Attitude and Ephemeris V001 [Data set]. NASA Land Processes Distributed Active Archive Center. https://doi.org/10.5067/EMIT/EMITL1BATT.001 Date Accessed: 2025-11-02

File Naming Convention

EMIT_L1B_ATT_001_20250911T072340_2525405.nc

The file name begins with the Sensor (EMIT) followed by the Processing Level (L1B), Product Type (ATT), Product Version Number (001), Date and Time of Acquisition designated as YYYYMMDDTHHMMSS (20250911T072340), Unique Global Plume Complex Identifier (2525405), and the Data Format (nc).

Documents

Data collected by NASA's Earth Surface Mineral Dust Source Investigation (EMIT) on April 23, 2024, indicates the location of a variety of planet communites across a swath of the mid-Atlantic United States.

EMIT Tutorial Series

In this three-part tutorial series, learn how to use Python to process EMIT reflectance data.
Tutorial
June 14, 2023
SHOWING 1 OF 1

Variables

Variables are a set of physical properties whose values determine the characteristics or behavior of something. For example, temperature and pressure are variables of the atmosphere. Parameters and variables can be used interchangeably. Variable level attributes provide individual information for each variable.

The Name in this table is the variable name. Fill value indicates missing or undefined data points in a variable. Valid range is the range of values the variable can store. Scale factor is used to increase or decrease the size of an object and can be used to correct for distortion. For questions on a specific variable, please use the Earthdata Forum.

Name Description Units Data Type Fill Value Valid Range Scale Factor
Attitude quaternion Corrected attitude quaternion goes from spacecraft to ECI (J2000 Inertial Frame). The coefficient convention used has the real part in the first column. N/A float64 N/A N/A N/A
Attitude time_j2000 Time elements for corrected attitude quaternion Seconds float64 N/A N/A N/A
Ephemeris eci_position Corrected Ephemeris Earth-centered inertial (ECI) position (J2000 Inertial Frame) Meters float64 N/A N/A N/A
Ephemeris eci_velocity Corrected Ephemeris ECI velocity (J2000 Inertial Frame) m/s float64 N/A N/A N/A
Ephemeris time_j2000 Time elements for corrected ephemeris data Seconds float64 N/A N/A N/A
Uncorrected Attitude quaternion Uncorrected attitude quaternion goes from spacecraft to ECI (J2000 Inertial Frame). The coefficient convention used has the real part in the first column. This is the reported attitude from the ISS, without correction. N/A float64 N/A N/A N/A
Uncorrected Attitude time_j2000 Time elements for uncorrected attitude quaternion Seconds float64 N/A N/A N/A
Uncorrected Ephemeris eci_position Uncorrected Ephemeris Earth-centered inertial (ECI) position (J2000 Inertial Frame) Meters float64 N/A N/A N/A
Uncorrected Ephemeris eci_velocity Uncorrected Ephemeris ECI velocity (J2000 Inertial Frame) m/s float64 N/A N/A N/A
Uncorrected Ephemeris time_j2000 Time elements for uncorrected ephemeris data Seconds float64 N/A N/A N/A
You're viewing 10 of 10