Distributed Equivalent Algal Populations (DEAP) model

Paired measurements of phytoplankton absorption and backscatter, the inherent optical properties central to the interpretation of ocean colour remote sensing data, are notoriously rare. We present a dataset of Chlorophyll a (Chl a) -specific phytoplankton absorption, scatter and backscatter for 17 different phytoplankton functional types, derived from first principles using measured in vivo pigment absorption and a well-validated semi-analytical coated sphere model which simulates the entire suite of biophysically consistent phytoplankton optical properties. The optical properties of each simulated phytoplankton cell are integrated over an entire size distribution and are provided at high spectral resolution. The model code is additionally included to enable user access to the entire set of wavelength-dependent, angularly resolved volume scattering functions. This optically coherent dataset of hyperspectral optical properties for a set of globally significant phytoplankton groups has potential for use in algorithm development towards the optimal exploitation of the new age of hyperspectral satellite radiometry. This codebase has been updated to include spectral libraries of over 80 different species of phytoplankton, and non-algal particle assemblages and has been heavily parallelized on NASA supercomputers to enable the creation of 1000s of simulations in minutes.