MRO: CRISM

CRISM is the Compact Reconnaissance Imaging Spectrometer for Mars, a visible-infrared hyperspectral mapper that maps the geology, composition, and layering of surface features on Mars. CRISM data sets are produced by the CRISM Science Team at Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory, Laurel, Maryland.

NOTE: CRISM L data stopped being collected on February 15, 2018, due to failure of the thermoelectric coolers.

CRISM Documentation

Read the CRISM Data Product Specification, also known as the CRISM SIS (PDF, 9 MB) for information about the structure and content of CRISM data products. This is essential reading for any CRISM user. Additional help in processing and using CRISM data is available in the presentations from the MRO CRISM Data Users' Workshop.

The various CRISM observing modes are described in the poster The Illustrated Guide to CRISM Observing Modes (May 2017) and in this presentation from the CRISM Team, Brief History of CRISM Observing Modes (November 2015). 

Read the CRISM Data Set Specification (PDF, 1.5 MB) for information about the organization of CRISM data sets. There is more than just the data products!

Visit the CRISM Team Web Site at APL for the latest news about CRISM.

CRISM Data Sets

Tools

	Mars Orbital Data Explorer - Online service that provides search, display, and download  tools for CRISM data, developed by the PDS Geosciences Node
	CAT (CRISM Analysis Toolkit) - A collection of ENVI and IDL procedures for reading, displaying, and analyzing CRISM data, produced by the CRISM Science Team. General CAT information Introduction to CAT presentation from 3/22/09 workshop (9 MB PDF) CAT User's Guide CAT for ENVI version 5.3 or above (all files revised 11/14/23) CAT map projection fix files (23 KB zip file) CAT map projection fix instructions (444 KB PDF) CAT 7.4 for ENVI 5.x for Unix  (542 MB zip file) CAT 7.4 Installation Guide for Unix (802 KB PDF) CAT 7.4 for ENVI 5.x for Windows (542 MB zip file) CAT 7.4 Installation Guide for Windows (804 KB PDF) CAT 7.4 History String Description (3KB text file) CAT 7.4 Release Notes (7 KB text file) CAT for ENVI version 4.x (Classic) (all files revised 1/2/19) CAT 7.4 Complete Download (523 MB zip file) Software files only (9.5 MB zip file) Auxiliary files only (513 MB zip file) CAT 7.4 Release Notes (7 KB text file) CAT 7.4 History String Description (3 KB text file) CAT Installation Guide (162 KB PDF) Notice: For some CRISM MRDR data, users may encounter an error when using CAT (CRISM Analysis Toolkit) to process the data if their map projections are polar stereographic. We have told the original CAT developer about this error, and he is still working on it. We will update the CAT source files once we get the fix. Thanks for your patience.
	JCAT (Java CRISM Analysis Tool) - A java-based tool for viewing CRISM data, developed by the CRISM Science Team. It provides many features of CAT and does not require an ENVI license. The CRISM team has made its source code available on Github. JCAT 1.1 (released Oct. 31, 2024) (134 MB ZIP archive containing executable Java JAR) JCAT 1.1 tutorial (6.4 MB PDF) To use JCAT, download and extract the ZIP archive. If your operating system is Windows, run the file windows/runJCAT.bat. If your operating system is MacOS, Linux, or another *nix OS, run unix/runJCAT.

Note Regarding TRDR Version 3 Reprocessing

As of February 9, 2010, the TRDRs (Targeted Reduced Data Records) are being created with version 3 of the CRISM processing software, which includes improved calibration procedures. Compared to version 2 TRDRs, these products have had most artifacts corrected and noise reduced by use of a sophisticated filtering process. The CRISM Team has revised all previously released TRDRs using the improved software. For more information see the revised Data Set Description (trdr_ds.cat) and Software Interface Specification (crism_dpsis.pdf).

The previously released TRDR version 2 products have been taken offline.

CDRs (Calibration Data Records)  have also been reprocessed as part of this effort. The Version 3 CDRs are stored on the EDR volumes in their usual CDR directory, and the Version 2 CDRs that they replace have been taken offline.

Users of TRDR Version 3 products please note: The hyperspectral noise filter applied to the I/F version of CRISM TRDRs in version 3 of the radiometric calibration pipeline is described in this file (PDF, 13.3 MB). The format of the file is a flowchart describing different steps in the filtering process, which is applied to full or half resolution targeted observations (the central swaths of FRT, HRL, or HRS observations). Other products taken with greater levels of pixel binning are not filtered at this time. A future version of the CRISM Data Products SIS will describe the filtering algorithm in greater detail.