McIDAS-V: Advances in data analysis and visualization for environmental satellite data

The University of Wisconsin's Space Science and Engineering Center (SSEC) has been at the forefront in developing data analysis and visualization tools for environmental satellites and other geophysical data. The fifth generation of the Man-computer Interactive Data Access System (McIDAS-V) is a java-based, open-source, freely available system for multispectral and hyperspectral researchers and algorithm developers. The software tools provide powerful new data manipulation and visualization capabilities that work with geostationary and polar orbiting satellite data and in the research and operational environments. McIDAS-V provides powerful and unique capabilities to support innovative techniques for developing and evaluating algorithms, visualizing data and products in 4 dimensions, and validating results. For polar orbiting applications, METOP IASI, EOS AIRS and MODIS, and A-Train data are used in applications to examine data, evaluate products and validate results. The U.S. NPP/JPSS program is supporting McIDAS-V development for the VIIRS, CrIS and ATMS imager and sounder instruments which provide atmospheric and sea surface temperatures, humidity sounding, cloud and aerosol properties, and numerous other environmental products. For geostationary applications, NOAA is supporting the development of ABI prototype products using MSG SEVIRI data in simulation experiments for the U.S. GOES-R+ program, which will bring another advanced multi-spectral imager into geostationary orbit. Used together, the geostationary environmental satellites provides the user community with detailed global coverage with rapid update cycles. This presentation will display and demonstrate some of the capabilities of McIDAS-V to analyze and display high temporal and spectral resolution data using examples from international environmental satellites.