So ESA developed the Medspiration project to combine data from multiple satellite systems to produce sea-surface data for the waters around Europe and also the whole of the Atlantic Ocean.

Medspiration is a cooperative effort designed to provide near-real-time data to improve ocean forecasts, in the same way atmospheric models rely on satellite and on-the-ground surveys. The project is now making available a daily, ultra-high-resolution sea-surface temperature map focused on the Mediterranean Sea that is accurate to within 0.3 degree Celsius.

The project employs infrared instruments aboard ESA's Envisat to acquire sea-surface temperature readings in kilometer-square grids of ocean and provides readings accurate to within 0.2 degrees Celsius.

Medspiration also employs data from the Spinning Enhanced Visible and Infra-Red Imager SEVIRI aboard Meteosat-8; two Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer sensors on polar orbiters operated by the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, and a pair of Japanese-built instruments: the Advanced Microwave Scanning Radiometer, and the Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission's microwave imager aboard NASA's Aqua and the JAXA-NASA TRMM spacecraft, respectively.

Medspiration data have been available to users since November 2004, but project managers said Friday they have activated "significant" quality enhancements since last January. Those enhancements include 2-square-kilometer (0.77 square mile) resolution imagery over the Atlantic Ocean to match the grid of a major ocean forecasting model run by Italy's National Institute for Geophysics and Volcanology.

ESA scientists said they began the nighttime surveys because the instruments can measure water temperature only to a seawater depth to about 10 to 20 microns (thousandths of a meter). During the daytime, incoming solar radiation heats the topmost water layers, setting up steep temperature gradients that can mislead satellite instruments.

The gradients dissipate during the night and minimize at dawn, which is when heat-measuring satellite sensors such as radiometers get closest to taking the temperature of deeper water layers. Oceanographers are most interested in readings from those deeper layers, because they are thought to be more influential on climate change.

"Medspiration now provides ultra-high resolution SST products covering nearly all the European seas in addition to a substantial part of the north-east Atlantic," said Craig Donlon, head of the GHRSST-PP office. "This should help European NWP and ocean forecasting systems improve their services in the coming months.

Medspiration is being run as a demonstration project up until the end of 2007, with user consultations taking place every six months – the next scheduled for June. Mission scientists plan to extend the project to cover a range of other data, including water quality, algal blooms and oil-spills.

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