New Digital Elevation Model (DEM) Available
30 m ASTER GDEM
National Aeronautic and Space Administration
Japan's Ministry of Economy, Trade, and Industry
For further information, please go to:
http://www.nasa.gov/home/hqnews/2009/jun/HQ_09-150_ASTER_Topographic_Ma…
The National Aeronautic and Space Administration (NASA), together with
The Ministry of Economy, Trade, and Industry (METI) in Japan, have
released a new digital topographic map of Earth. The 30 m ASTER GDEM
provides the best accuracy and resolution currently available for
elevation datasets encompassing the Arctic.
The new global digital elevation model of Earth was created from nearly
1.3 million individual stereo-pair images collected by the Japanese
Advanced Spaceborne Thermal Emission and Reflection Radiometer (ASTER)
instrument aboard NASA's Terra spacecraft. The data is available online
and is provided at no cost.
The new ASTER data expands topographic coverage to 99 percent of Earth's
landmass, from 83 degrees north latitude and 83 degrees south. Each
elevation measurement point in the new data is 30 m (98 ft) apart.
NASA and METI are jointly contributing the ASTER topographic data to the
Group on Earth Observations, an international partnership headquartered
at the World Meteorological Organization in Geneva, Switzerland, for use
in its Global Earth Observation System of Systems. This "system of
systems" is a collaborative, international effort to share and integrate
Earth observation data from many different instruments and systems to
help monitor and forecast global environmental changes.
For further information, please go to:
http://www.nasa.gov/home/hqnews/2009/jun/HQ_09-150_ASTER_Topographic_Ma…
http://www.nasa.gov/topics/earth/features/20090629.html
http://www.gdem.aster.ersdac.or.jp/