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    • SNF Leaf Optical Properties: Cary-14

    Metadata Updated: September 18, 2025

    Knowledge of the optical properties of the components of the forest canopy is important to the understanding of how plants interact with their environment and how this information may be used to determine vegetation characteristics using remote sensing. During the summers of 1983 and 1984, samples of the major components of the boreal forest canopy (needles, leaves, branches, moss, litter) were collected in the Superior National Forest (SNF) of Minnesota and sent to the Johnson Space Center (JSC). At JSC, the spectral reflectance and transmittance characteristics of the samples were determined for wavelengths between .35 and 2.1 micrometers using the Cary-14 radiometer. This report presents plots of these data as well as averages to the Thematic Mapper Simulator (TMS) bands. There were two main thrusts to the SNF optical properties study. The first was to collect the optical properties of many of the components of the boreal forest canopy. The second goal of the study was to investigate the variability of optical properties within a species. The results of these studies allow a comparison of the optical properties of a variety of different species and a measure of the variability within species. These data provide basic information necessary to model canopy reflectance patterns.

    Access & Use Information

    Public: This dataset is intended for public access and use. License: No license information was provided. If this work was prepared by an officer or employee of the United States government as part of that person's official duties it is considered a U.S. Government Work.

    Downloads & Resources

    Dates

    Metadata Created Date April 11, 2025
    Metadata Updated Date September 18, 2025

    Metadata Source

    Harvested from NASA Data.json

    Other Data Resources

    Additional Metadata

    Resource Type Dataset
    Metadata Created Date April 11, 2025
    Metadata Updated Date September 18, 2025
    Publisher ORNL_DAAC
    Maintainer
    Identifier 10.3334/ORNLDAAC/183
    Data Last Modified 2025-09-11
    Category Earth Science
    Public Access Level public
    Bureau Code 026:00
    Metadata Context https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema/catalog.jsonld
    Schema Version https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema
    Catalog Describedby https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema/catalog.json
    Harvest Object Id ad66b23f-5225-45fd-b63a-581c5b1f01e1
    Harvest Source Id 58f92550-7a01-4f00-b1b2-8dc953bd598f
    Harvest Source Title NASA Data.json
    Homepage URL https://search.earthdata.nasa.gov/search?q=SNF_LEAFCARY_183&ac=true
    Old Spatial {"WestBoundingCoordinate":-92.5058,"NorthBoundingCoordinate":48.1697,"EastBoundingCoordinate":-91.7658,"SouthBoundingCoordinate":47.6575},"CARTESIAN"
    Program Code 026:000
    Source Datajson Identifier True
    Source Hash ef23bf04425a379506fbdb50c446e1047a45a56b367578f266e5b88f15b13bca
    Source Schema Version 1.1
    Spatial
    Temporal 1984-05-10/1984-05-10

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