Technical note: NASAaccess – A tool for access, reformatting, and visualization of remotely sensed earth observation and climate data

Abstract

Abstract. NASA has launched a new initiative; the Open-Source Science Initiative (OSSI) to enable and support science towards openness. The OSSI initiative supports open-source software development and dissemination. In this work, we present NASAaccess which is an open-source software package and web-based environmental modeling application for earth observation data accessing, reformatting, and presenting quantitative data products. The main objective of developing the NASAaccess platform is to facilitate exploration, modeling, and understanding of earth data for scientists, stakeholders, and concerned citizens whose objectives align with the new OSSI goals. The NASAaccess platform is available as software packages (i.e., R and conda packages) as well as an interactive format web-based environmental modeling application for earth observation data developed with the Tethys Platform. The NASAaccess has been envisioned to lower the technical barriers and simplify the process of accessing scalable distributed computing resources and leverage additional software for data and computationally intensive modeling frameworks. Specifically, NASAaccess is developed to meet the need for seamless earth observation remote sensing and climate data ingestion into various hydrological modeling frameworks. Moreover, NASAaccess is also contributing to keep interested parties and stakeholders engaged with environmental modeling, accessing the information available in various remote sensing products. NASAaccess current capabilities covers various NASA datasets and products that include the Global Precipitation Measurement (GPM) data products, the Global Land Data Assimilation System (GLDAS) land surface states and fluxes, and the NASA Earth Exchange Global Daily Downscaled Projections (NEX-GDDP) Coupled Model Intercomparison Project Phase 5 (CMIP5) & Coupled Model Intercomparison Project Phase 6 (CMIP6) climate change dataset products.