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Description
This data set (ATL08) contains along-track heights above the WGS84 ellipsoid (ITRF2014 reference frame) for the ground and canopy surfaces. The canopy and ground surfaces are processed in fixed 100 m data segments, which typically contain more than 100 signal photons. The data were acquired by the Advanced Topographic Laser Altimeter System (ATLAS) instrument on board the Ice, Cloud and land Elevation Satellite-2 (ICESat-2) observatory.
Version Description
Added a quality check to reject segments for which the canopy photons fall more than 150 m below the reference DEM; Calculated the background noise rate and number of noise photons within a canopy segment and adjusted the canopy radiometric rate accordingly; For segments with a solar elevation angle > 20°, if the background noise rate is < 0.98 of the canopy rate, then reassign the canopy photons as noise photons; Incorporated the YAPC photon weights from the ATL03 data product into the ground-finding approach; Reduced the number of labeled photons required to report the canopy or terrain heights within each segment for the strong and weak beams, resulting in more ATL08 reported values.
Citation is critically important for dataset documentation and discovery. This dataset is openly shared, without restriction, in accordance with the EOSDIS Data Use and Citation Guidance.
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Neuenschwander, A., Pitts, K., Jelley, B., Robbins, J., Markel, J., Popescu, S., Nelson, R., Harding, D., Pederson, D., Klotz, B., & Sheridan, R. (2023). ATLAS/ICESat-2 L3A Land and Vegetation Height, Version 6 [Dataset]. NASA National Snow and Ice Data Center Distributed Active Archive Center. https://doi.org/10.5067/ATLAS/ATL08.006 Date Accessed: 2026-08-02
Neuenschwander, A., Pitts, K., Jelley, B., Robbins, J., Markel, J., Popescu, S., Nelson, R., Harding, D., Pederson, D., Klotz, B., & Sheridan, R. (2023). ATLAS/ICESat-2 L3A Land and Vegetation Height, Version 6 [Dataset]. NASA National Snow and Ice Data Center Distributed Active Archive Center. https://doi.org/10.5067/ATLAS/ATL08.006 Date Accessed: 2026-08-02
Neuenschwander, Amy, et al. “ATLAS/ICESat-2 L3A Land and Vegetation Height, Version 6.” NASA National Snow and Ice Data Center Distributed Active Archive Center, 2023, https://doi.org/10.5067/ATLAS/ATL08.006. Date Accessed: 2026-08-02