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Access and Visualize HyTES Data

Overview

The Hyperspectral Thermal Emission Spectrometer (HyTES) is now available through NASA Earthdata and the Earthdata Cloud as airborne Facility Instrument data.

In this tutorial, we will use earthaccess to discover, access, and visualize HyTES data over a region of interest — the Langebaan Lagoon Marine Protected Area in South Africa, acquired during the BioSCape campaign.

The HyTES instrument is an airborne imaging spectrometer with 256 spectral channels between 7.5 and 12 micrometers in the thermal infrared (TIR) part of the electromagnetic spectrum and 512 pixels cross-track. HyTES provides high spatial and high spectral resolution data on surface temperature and emissivity. TIR data are used to measure land surface temperature (LST), which informs models of water flux from land surface through processes such as evapotranspiration and supports applications like point-source pollution detection and volcano monitoring.

Datasets Used

DatasetDOIConcept ID
HyTES Level 1 Radiance, Facility Instrument CollectionHook et al. (2026)C4205447735-ORNL_CLOUD
HyTES L1 Geolocation, Facility Instrument CollectionHook et al. (2026)C4254189775-ORNL_CLOUD
HyTES: Level 2 Emissivity and Land Surface TemperatureHulley et al. (2026)C4247014847-ORNL_CLOUD

Learning Objectives

  • Discover available HyTES datasets on NASA Earthdata using earthaccess

  • Search for granules by bounding box and date range, and extract CMR footprint geometries to map flight lines

  • Stream HyTES L1 Radiance and L2 Land Surface Temperature data directly from the Earthdata Cloud

  • Visualize flight paths, L1 radiance bands, and L2 LST/emissivity

Prerequisites

A free NASA Earthdata Login account is required. See the prerequisites page for setup instructions.

Citation

Hook, S. J., Hulley, G. C., La, T. T., Rivera, G., Johnson, W. R., & Eng, B. T. (2026). HyTES Level 1 Radiance, Facility Instrument Collection (Version 1). ORNL DAAC. Hook et al. (2026)

Hook, S. J., Hulley, G. C., La, T. T., Rivera, G., Johnson, W. R., & Eng, B. T. (2026). HyTES: Level 2 Emissivity and Land Surface Temperature (Version 1). ORNL DAAC. Hulley et al. (2026)

Import Libraries

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Authenticate with NASA Earthdata

earthaccess.login() handles authentication with your NASA Earthdata Login credentials. It will look for stored credentials first, then prompt if not found. Credentials can be persisted with persist=True.

Discover HyTES Datasets

We can use earthaccess.search_datasets() to list all HyTES datasets available on NASA Earthdata.

HyTES datasets found: 11

  Short name : HyTES_Calibration_Data_2468
  Short name : HyTES_L1_Geolocation_2459
  Short name : HyTES_L1_Geolocation_2013_2016_2467
  Short name : HyTES_L1_Flight_Path_2463
  Short name : HyTES_L1_Radiance_Overlays_2466
  Short name : HyTES_L1_Radiance_2462
  Short name : HyTES_L1_Radiance_2013_2016_2476
  Short name : HyTES_L2_Emissivity_Overlays_2469
  Short name : HyTES_L2_Emissivity_LST_2460
  Short name : SHIFT_HyTES_L1_2022_2245
  Short name : SHIFT_HyTES_L2_2022_2246

Study Area

We will use the boundary of Langebaan Lagoon Marine Protected Area as our region of interest (ROI). Langebaan is a coastal conservation area in South Africa declared as a Ramsar Site. This area was surveyed during the 2023 BioSCape campaign.

A local GeoJSON of the study area polygon is available in the data/ directory.

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Each granule returned by earthaccess.search_data() carries a CMR spatial footprint — the bounding polygon that NASA’s Common Metadata Repository (CMR) stores for that granule. We can extract these footprint polygons directly from the L1 Radiance search results (DOI: Hook et al. (2026)) to map the flight lines without opening any files.

L1 Radiance granules found: 26
  20231026t124346_LangebaanBox9ZA_L1_B110_V01
  20231026t125601_LangebaanBox9ZA_L1_B110_V01
  20231026t130800_LangebaanBox9ZA_L1_B110_V01
  20231026t132008_LangebaanBox9ZA_L1_B110_V01
  20231026t133258_LangebaanBox9ZA_L1_B110_V01
  20231026t134517_LangebaanBox9ZA_L1_B110_V01
  20231026t135720_LangebaanBox9ZA_L1_B110_V01
  20231026t140938_LangebaanBox9ZA_L1_B110_V01
  20231026t142132_LangebaanBox9ZA_L1_B110_V01
  20231026t143401_LangebaanBox9ZA_L1_B110_V01
  20231026t144600_LangebaanBox9ZA_L1_B110_V01
  20231029t071408_LangebaanBox9ZA_L1_B110_V01
  20231029t071516_LangebaanBox9ZA_L1_B110_V01
  20231029t072634_LangebaanBox9ZA_L1_B110_V01
  20231029t072742_LangebaanBox9ZA_L1_B110_V01
  20231029t074013_LangebaanBox9ZA_L1_B110_V01
  20231029t075159_LangebaanBox9ZA_L1_B110_V01
  20231029t075313_LangebaanBox9ZA_L1_B110_V01
  20231029t080449_LangebaanBox9ZA_L1_B110_V01
  20231029t080559_LangebaanBox9ZA_L1_B110_V01
  20231029t081958_LangebaanBox9ZA_L1_B110_V01
  20231029t082109_LangebaanBox9ZA_L1_B110_V01
  20231029t083439_LangebaanBox9ZA_L1_B110_V01
  20231029t083545_LangebaanBox9ZA_L1_B110_V01
  20231029t084700_LangebaanBox9ZA_L1_B110_V01
  20231029t084759_LangebaanBox9ZA_L1_B110_V01
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SRF and WMX files

Also notice there are *.csv files that are named as HyTES_SRF_* and HyTES_WMX_* available at https://data.ornldaac.earthdata.nasa.gov/public/hytes/HyTES_L1_Radiance/comp/HyTES_SRF_v6.csv and https://data.ornldaac.earthdata.nasa.gov/public/hytes/HyTES_L1_Radiance/comp/HyTES_WMX_v6.csv. These files provides information on Signal Response Function (SRF) and Wave Matrix Data (WMX). Let’s read these CSV files using pandas.

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We can now plot to show how the SRF is distributed for each HyTES bands. Use the slider in the plot to scroll across the bands.

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Search for HyTES L1 Radiance and L2 Granules

As we see above, there are two levels of HyTES products currently available for download: HyTES Level 1 (L1) product: Radiance and Locational Information and HyTES Level 2 (L2) product: Emissivity and Land Surface Temperature. The l1_granules from the previous section will be reused here to open and stream the actual radiance data. We also search for co-located L2 Emissivity and LST granules (DOI: 10.3334/ORNLDAAC/2460) over the same area and date range.

L2 Emissivity/LST granules found: 26
  20231026t124346_LangebaanBox9ZA_L2_B200_V06
  20231026t125601_LangebaanBox9ZA_L2_B200_V06
  20231026t130800_LangebaanBox9ZA_L2_B200_V06
  20231026t132008_LangebaanBox9ZA_L2_B200_V06
  20231026t133258_LangebaanBox9ZA_L2_B200_V06
  20231026t134517_LangebaanBox9ZA_L2_B200_V06
  20231026t135720_LangebaanBox9ZA_L2_B200_V06
  20231026t140938_LangebaanBox9ZA_L2_B200_V06
  20231026t142132_LangebaanBox9ZA_L2_B200_V06
  20231026t143401_LangebaanBox9ZA_L2_B200_V06
  20231026t144600_LangebaanBox9ZA_L2_B200_V06
  20231029t071408_LangebaanBox9ZA_L2_B200_V06
  20231029t071516_LangebaanBox9ZA_L2_B200_V06
  20231029t072634_LangebaanBox9ZA_L2_B200_V06
  20231029t072742_LangebaanBox9ZA_L2_B200_V06
  20231029t074013_LangebaanBox9ZA_L2_B200_V06
  20231029t075159_LangebaanBox9ZA_L2_B200_V06
  20231029t075313_LangebaanBox9ZA_L2_B200_V06
  20231029t080449_LangebaanBox9ZA_L2_B200_V06
  20231029t080559_LangebaanBox9ZA_L2_B200_V06
  20231029t081958_LangebaanBox9ZA_L2_B200_V06
  20231029t082109_LangebaanBox9ZA_L2_B200_V06
  20231029t083439_LangebaanBox9ZA_L2_B200_V06
  20231029t083545_LangebaanBox9ZA_L2_B200_V06
  20231029t084700_LangebaanBox9ZA_L2_B200_V06
  20231029t084759_LangebaanBox9ZA_L2_B200_V06

We’ll work with one of the matching L1 and L2 granule. earthaccess.open() returns file-like objects that stream data directly from the cloud — no local download needed.

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L1 file: ornl-cumulus-prod-protected/hytes/HyTES_L1_Radiance/data/20231026t133258_LangebaanBox9ZA_L1_B110_V01.hdf5
L2 file: ornl-cumulus-prod-protected/hytes/HyTES_L2_Emissivity_LST/data/20231026t133258_LangebaanBox9ZA_L2_B200_V06.hdf5

HyTES L1 Radiance

The L1 data file (HDF-5) provides calibrated radiance in band-interleaved-by-pixel (BIP) format with three dimensions:

  • line — along-track scan lines (variable length)

  • sample — 512 cross-track pixels

  • band — 256 spectral channels from 7.5–12 µm

The file also includes per-pixel geolocation (latitude, longitude).

Let’s open it with xarray and explore its structure.

Lines: 4456, Samples: 512, Bands: 256
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Plot a Single Radiance Band

Band 179 is near 10.8 µm, a commonly used window channel for LST retrieval.

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False-Color Radiance Composite

We create a false-color RGB composite using three TIR channels:

  • R: Band 150 (~10.1 µm)

  • G: Band 100 (~9.2 µm)

  • B: Band 58 (~8.5 µm)

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Radiance Spectra for Selected Surface Types

Let’s compare radiance spectra from three surface types within the scene: inshore water, land, and open water. We find the pixel nearest to each reference location using the per-pixel latitude/longitude arrays.

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HyTES L2 Land Surface Temperature and Emissivity

The HyTES Level 2 dataset (DOI: 10.3334/ORNLDAAC/2460) provides three key variables in HDF-5 format, derived using the Temperature Emissivity Separation (TES) algorithm:

VariableDescriptionSpectral RangeBands
L2_LSTLand surface temperature in Kelvin. Derived from atmospherically corrected level-1 radiance data using the TES algorithm.—1
L2_EmissivityEmissivity spectral data from 8.2-11.5 micrometers, retrieved on 164 Temperature Emissivity Separation (TES) bands instead of 256.8.2–11.5 µm164
L2_Emissivity_PCPrincipal Component (PC) eigenvector regression emissivity data from 7.4-12 micrometers for all 256 channels.7.4–12.0 µm256

Note some HyTES campaigns are flown on “ER2” and others campaigns are “Twin Otter” flights. The L2 products are slightly different between these two flights. Please refer to the user guide and the L2 ATBD for more information.

L2 variables: ['ISAC_Path_Rad', 'ISAC_Skydown_Rad', 'L2_Emissivity', 'L2_Emissivity_PC', 'L2_Emissivity_PC_Wavelengths', 'L2_Emissivity_Wavelengths', 'L2_LST', 'Transmission']
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Land Surface Temperature

LST is stored in Kelvin. We plot the full spatial image to see the temperature distribution across the flight line.

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Emissivity Spectra for Selected Surface Types

Using the same reference locations as before, we compare the two emissivity products (L2_Emissivity on 164 TES bands and L2_Emissivity_PC on all 256 channels) at the inshore pixel.

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Summary

In this tutorial we used earthaccess.search_datasets(instrument="HyTES") to discover all HyTES collections on NASA Earthdata. We then searched for L1 Radiance granules over Langebaan Lagoon during the BioSCape 2023 campaign, and plotted the CMR granule footprint polygons as flight lines — no extra file download needed. We also streamed HDF-5 files directly from the Earthdata Cloud using earthaccess.open() — no local download required. We opened and explored the L1 radiance dataset with xarray, plotted a single band and a false-color TIR composite, and compared radiance spectra across surface types. We finally opened the L2 dataset to visualize the Land Surface Temperature image and compare TES vs. PC-regression emissivity products.

References
  1. Hook, S. J., Hulley, G. C., La, T. T., Rivera, G., Johnson, W. R., & Eng, B. T. (2026). HyTES Level 1 Radiance, Facility Instrument Collection. ORNL Distributed Active Archive Center. 10.3334/ORNLDAAC/2462
  2. Hook, S. J., Hulley, G. C., La, T. T., Rivera, G., Johnson, W. R., & Eng, B. T. (2026). HyTES L1 Geolocation, Facility Instrument Collection. ORNL Distributed Active Archive Center. 10.3334/ORNLDAAC/2459
  3. Hulley, G. C., Hook, S. J., La, T. T., Rivera, G., Johnson, W. R., & Eng, B. T. (2026). HyTES: Level 2 Emissivity and Land Surface Temperature. ORNL Distributed Active Archive Center. 10.3334/ORNLDAAC/2460