A Message From the GES DISC/DAAC Manager
Welcome to the NASA Goddard Earth Sciences (GES) Data and Information Services Center (DISC). We are one of eight NASA Science Mission Directorate (SMD) DAACs that provide Earth science data, information, and services to research scientists, applications scientists, applications users, and students. The GES DISC is the home (archive) of NASA Precipitation and Hydrology, as well as Atmospheric Composition and Dynamics, data and information. The GES DISC also houses the Modern Era Retrospective-Analysis for Research and Applications (MERRA) data assimilation datasets (generated by GSFC’s Global Modeling and Assimilation Office), and the North American Land Data Assimilation System (NLDAS) and Global Land Data Assimilation System (GLDAS) data products (both generated by GSFC's Hydrological Sciences Branch).
The GES DISC is located at Goddard Space Flight Center, in Greenbelt, Maryland.
In recent years, the GES DISC has taken the ‘Information Services’ part of its name much more seriously, priding itself in developing tools and services that promote easier use and usability of Earth science data and information. As data and information management needs of science researchers have become more sophisticated, we have been able to take advantage of maturing information technologies to develop and implement tools and services that help science researchers extract the information they seek from the data they work with. This too is our goal.
I hope, as you visit our Web pages, you will find the data, information and services you are looking for. We are in the continuing process of enhancing data and information exploration and access and have, in fact, been making great strides in understanding how to – and implementing ways to – bring heterogeneous Earth science data sets together.
- Have you tried Giovanni yet? This data analysis and visualization tool has become extremely popular in allowing the community to create time series plots, latitude/longitude graphics, and atmospheric depth plots (just to name a few) without having to download any data.
- Multi-dataset systems such as NEESPI and A-Train Data Depot, also make it easy for data users to find and extract information from heterogeneous and distributed datasets.
- Also, check out the Hurricane portal to locate the actual precipitation data, as well as the images created from the data.
During your visit to our site, you will also find cross-links between the Earth science disciplines we have expertise in, the NASA remote sensing instruments we serve, the data parameters we provide, and the applications we specialize in. And you will find links to our collaborators, other NASA DAACs, the Instrument Teams that have worked hard to acquire, process, and validate the data, and NASA Federation of Earth Science Information Partners – all of which can provide additional Earth science data and information to you.
As always, OUR NUMBER ONE GOAL is to serve your Earth science data and information needs. I have been at the GES DISC since 1998, and this is (simply) what the GES DISC staff has always done! However, I believe we can always improve.
If you cannot find what you are looking for, or you have suggestions on how we can improve our services (tools), PLEASE let us know. Direct one-on-one interaction is the most effective way for us to serve you and others who come to the GES DISC. That is, if you don't tell us how we can help, we can't help!!
Thank you for visiting us and have a nice 'stay'.
Sincerely,
Steve Kempler
GES DISC/DAAC Manager
Steven.J.Kempler@nasa.gov
