Nimbus-7 CZCS Global Binned Diffuse Attenuation Coefficient for Downwelling Irradiance (KD490) Data, version 2014

The Coastal Zone Color Scanner Experiment (CZCS) was the first instrument devoted to the measurement of ocean color and flown on a spacecraft. Although other instruments flown on other spacecraft had sensed ocean color, their spectral bands, spatial resolution and dynamic range were optimized for land or meteorological use and had limited sensitivity in this area, whereas in CZCS, every parameter was optimized for use over water to the exclusion of any other type of sensing. CZCS had six spectral bands, four of which were used primarily for ocean color. These were of a 20 nanometer bandwidth centered at 443, 520, 550, and 670 nm. Band 5 had a 100 nm bandwidth centered at 750 nm and a dynamic range more suited to land. Band 6 operated in the 10.5 to 12.5 micrometer region and sensed emitted thermal radiance for derivation of equivalent black body temperature. (This thermal band failed within the first year of the mission, and so was not used in the global processing effort.) Bands 1-4 were preset to view water only and saturated when the IFOV was over most types of land surfaces, or clouds.