Split-Window Coefficients for Land Surface Temperature Retrieval From Low-Resolution Thermal Infrared Sensors

In this letter, we provide a complete set of split-window coefficients that can be used to retrieve land surface temperature (LST) from thermal infrared sensors onboard the most popular remote-sensing satellites: ERS-ATSR2, ENVISAT-AATSR, Terra/Aqua-MODIS, NOAA series-AVHRR, METOP-AVHRR3, GOES series-IMAGER, and MSG1/MSG2-SEVIRI. The coefficients have been obtained by minimization from an extensive simulated database constructed from MODTRAN radiative transfer code calculations, emissivity spectra extracted from spectral libraries, and spectral response functions of the thermal bands considered. This letter also analyzes the magnitude of the error on the LST retrieval and the contribution to the error of the different uncertainties. Results are summarized in a lookup table useful for scientists interested on land surface retrievals at global scale, thereby facilitating and homogenizing the task of retrieving this parameter from different common sensors.