EO·Atlas
Ocean salinity
Ocean salinity covers sea-surface salinity and related density structure used to track freshwater fluxes, ocean circulation, stratification, and air-sea exchange. The core spaceborne measurement route is L-band microwave radiometry: SMOS, SMAP, and Aquarius-class missions retrieve salinity from brightness-temperature changes at protected L-band frequencies.[1][2]
Operational salinity products split into direct satellite L3 fields and gap-free L4 analyses. L3 products preserve the satellite retrieval lineage, while L4 products combine SMOS, SMAP, in-situ salinity, and SST information to produce daily global sea-surface-salinity and density fields.[3]
The practical limitations are coarse spatial resolution and corrections near land, sea ice, rain, and rough seas. Those constraints make fusion and cross-sensor harmonisation important supporting methods, but the first-choice acquisition physics remains L-band radiometry.[1]
What's available today
3 data products and 6 sensors. Start with the most-used; switch to Filter for the full catalogue.
- [1]Copernicus Marine SMOS CATDS qualified sea surface salinity productagency doc2026-06-08
- [2]RSS SMAP Level 3 sea surface salinity 8-day running mean V6, PO.DAACagency doc2026-06-08
- [3]Copernicus Marine global L4 sea surface salinity and density productagency doc2026-06-08
How to cite this page
Plain text
Ocean salinity. EO-Atlas, SpectraWorks B.V. https://eo-atlas.org/topics/ocean-salinity (CC BY 4.0)
BibTeX
@misc{eoatlas:topics:ocean-salinity,
title = {Ocean salinity},
author = {{EO-Atlas}},
publisher = {SpectraWorks B.V.},
note = {CC BY 4.0},
url = {https://eo-atlas.org/topics/ocean-salinity}
}