SeaBASS, which stands for SeaWiFS Bio-optical Archive and Storage System, is NASA’s data archive for in situ oceanographic and atmospheric datasets maintained by the Ocean Biology Distributed Active Archive Center (OB.DAAC) at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center. In addition to serving as a data repository, SeaBASS operates as a ground-truth, satellite validation and comparison system in support of NASA’s satellite ocean color missions, which take measurements of Earth's ocean and atmosphere. The SeaBASS archive hosts an in-situ-to-satellite validation match-up system, comparing a variety of oceanic and atmospheric parameters, including chlorophyll-a, remote sensing reflectance, absorption, backscatter, and attenuation coefficients, aerosol optical thickness, and more.

While the SeaBASS archive and validation system were initially built for the SeaWiFS satellite instrument, launched in 1997, SeaBASS has since continued to serve NASA-supported follow-on ocean-color satellite missions, including Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) Aqua and Terra, Medium Resolution Imaging Spectrometer (MERIS), and the joint NOAA/NASA Suomi National Polar-orbiting Partnership (Suomi-NPP) Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite (VIIRS). This webinar will focus on how SeaBASS can be leveraged for data search, discovery, and access, and will demonstrate how SeaBASS supports NASA’s ocean color satellite products and the broader scientific community through data management and value-added post-processing features of the SeaBASS tool suite. The webinar will also present a brief overview of satellite ocean color remote sensing concepts that are relevant to how the SeaBASS bio-optical archive and validation system functions.