Intercomparison of Terra ASTER, MISR, and MODIS, and Landsat-7 ETM+

Abstract

The Advanced Spaceborne Thermal Emission and Reflection and Radiometer (ASTER), Multi-angle Imaging Spectroradiometer (MISR) and Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) are all onboard the Terra platform. The Landsat-7 platform is in orbit approximately 30 minutes ahead of Terra carrying the Enhanced Thematic Mapper Plus (ETM+) sensor. An important aspect of the use of these sensors, and other Earth Science Enterprise sensors, has been the characterization and calibration of the sensors and validation of their data products to allow synergistic use of the sensor data. The Remote Sensing Group at the University of Arizona has been active in the area of calibration and intercomparison through the use of ground-based test sites. This paper presents the results from the reflectance-base approach using the Railroad Valley Playa test site in Nevada for ASTER, ETM+, MISR, and MODIS and thus effectively a cross-calibration between all four sensors. The results show that there is good agreement between the sensors in the VNIR and all sensors show similar standard deviations of the average with MISR showing the smallest standard deviations and ASTER the largest. ETM+, MISR, and MODIS agree to better than 4% in all bands and better than 2% in equivalent MISR bands land 2. Agreement in the shortwave infrared is not as close with Band 4 of ASTER, Band 5 of ETM+, and Band 6 of MODIS disagreeing by more than 6%. ASTER show large standard deviations and the percent differences for bands 6-9 that are much larger than those seen for MODIS and ETM+.