Monthly burned area from the Global Fire Emissions Database (GFED)
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- Visualizations by:
- Cindy Starr
- View full credits
This time series was created using data from the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectrometer (MODIS) onboard NASA’s Terra and Aqua satellites. Burned area is estimated by applying an algorithm that detects rapid changes in visible and infrared surface reflectance imagery. Fires typically darken the surface in the visible part of the electromagnetic spectrum, and brighten the surface in several wavelength bands in the shortwave infrared that are sensitive to the surface water content of vegetation. Thermal emissions from actively burning fires also are measured by MODIS and are used to improve the burned area estimates in croplands and other areas where the fire sizes are relatively small. This animation portrays burned area between September 2000 and August 2015 as a percent of the ¼ degree grid cell that was burned each month. The values on the color bar are on a log scale, so the regions shown in blue and green shades indicate small burned areas while those in red and orange represent a larger percent of the region burned. Beneath the burned area, the seasonal Blue Marble landcover shows the advance and retreat of snow in the northern hemisphere. More information about the Global Fire Emissions Database, including maps of burned area and fire emissions, can be found here.
Credits
Please give credit for this item to:
NASA's Scientific Visualization Studio
The Blue Marble Next Generation data is courtesy of Reto Stockli (NASA/GSFC).
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Visualizer
- Cindy Starr (Global Science and Technology, Inc.) [Lead]
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Scientists
- Doug C. Morton (NASA/GSFC)
- Jim Randerson (University of California, Irvine)
- Yang Chen (University of California, Irvine)
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Producers
- Ellen T. Gray (NASA/HQ)
- Kayvon Sharghi (USRA)
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Project support
- Eric Sokolowsky (Global Science and Technology, Inc.)
- Joycelyn Thomson Jones (NASA/GSFC)
- Leann Johnson (Global Science and Technology, Inc.)
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Technical support
- Ian Jones (ADNET Systems, Inc.)
- Laurence Schuler (ADNET Systems, Inc.)
Datasets used in this visualization
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Terra and Aqua BMNG (Blue Marble: Next Generation)
ID: 508Credit: The Blue Marble data is courtesy of Reto Stockli (NASA/GSFC).
This dataset can be found at: http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Newsroom/BlueMarble/
See all pages that use this dataset -
MODIS Percent Monthly Burned Area
ID: 908
Note: While we identify the data sets used in these visualizations, we do not store any further details, nor the data sets themselves on our site.
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