Remote Sensing Lab
- NASA's Arctic-Boreal Vulnerability Experiment (ABoVE) gets off the ground
- Climate change in the Arctic and Boreal region is unfolding faster than anywhere on Earth, with important impacts on sea ice, permafrost, wildfires, lakes, rivers, coastlines, and ecosystems. To gain a better understanding of the vulnerability and resilience of ecosystems and society to this rapidly changing region, NASA is conducting a campaign in Alaska and western Canada called the Arctic-Boreal Vulnerability Experiment (ABoVE), using linked ground-, air-, and space-based observations.
- NASA | Earth from Orbit 2014
- NASA | Earth from Orbit 2014: Every day of every year, NASA satellites provide useful data about our home planet, and along the way, some beautiful images as well. This video includes satellite images of Earth in 2014 from NASA and its partners as well as photos and a time lapse video from the International Space Station.
- NASA Launches Soil Moisture Mapper
- NASA Launches Soil Moisture Mapper: SMAP (Soil Moisture Active/Passive). launched on a Delta II rocket from Vandenberg Air Force Base, Ca., on January 31, 2015. SMAP will provide high resolution, space-based measurements of soil moisture and its state -- frozen or thawed -- a new capability that will allow scientists to better predict natural hazards of extreme weather, climate change, floods and droughts, and help reduce uncertainties in our understanding of Earth's water, energy and carbon cycles.
- Liftoff of OCO-2
- Liftoff of NASA's OCO-2: On Jul 2, 2014 a Delta II rocket lifted off from Space Launch Complex 2 at Vandenberg Air Force Base, carrying the Orbiting Carbon Observatory, or OCO-2, satellite on a on a mission to study the Earth's atmosphere.
- NASA | GPM Rocket Launch
- NASA GPM Rocket Launch: Launch of the Global Precipitation Measurement (GPM) Core Observatory, February 28, 2014.
- Landsat 8 Launch (Landsat Data Continuity Mission) on Atlas V 401 on 2013-02-11 NASA
- The Landsat 8 Earth observation satellite was launched on February 11, 2013, as Landsat Data Continuity Mission (LDCM), a collaboration between NASA and the U.S. Geological Survey. It provides moderate-resolution measurements of Earth's terrestrial and polar regions in the visible, near-infrared, short wave infrared, and thermal infrared. There are two instruments on the spacecraft, the Thermal InfraRed Sensor (TIRS) and the Operational Land Imager (OLI). Landsat 8 provides continuity with the nearly 40-year long Landsat land imaging data set, enabling people to study many aspects of our planet and to evaluate the dynamic changes caused by both natural processes and human practices.
The Remote Sensing Laboratory is located in the Department of Earth and Environmental Studies (EAES). Research activities in the lab are sponsored by NASA. Current projects to use data from NASA's Earth Observing System satellite instruments to map forest and shrubs in desert grasslands in the southwestern US and in Arctic tundra.
A research focus is the use of data from the unique NASA/JPL Multiangle Imaging Spectro-Radiometer (MISR), including cutting-edge work on mapping canopy height as well as crown cover; and mapping woody plant cover and community type in desert grasslands and Arctic tundra.
The Lab's members have included faculty, post-doctoral research associates, and graduate and undergraduate students.
Relevant courses include
- EAES 311 Fundamentals of Remote Sensing of the Environment (undergraduate)
- EAES 511 Fundamentals of Remote Sensing of the Environment (graduate)
- EAES 611 Advanced Environmental Remote Sensing and Image Processing (graduate)
- EAES 210 Introduction to GIS and Remote Sensing (2 hours lecture, 2 hours lab )
- EAES 310 Geographic Information Systems (GIS) (3 hours lab)
- EAES 410 Advanced Topics in GIScience (3 hours lecture)
- EAES 610 Spatial Analysis
- EAES 710 Advanced Geographic Information Systems
- Graduate Certificate Program in Geographic Information Science
- Independent Study at various levels.
- Changes in Shrub Abundance and Albedo in Arctic Tundra...
- Changes in Shrub Abundance in Arctic Tundra...
- Forest and shrub mapping with NASA EOS multiangle remote sensing data (MISR, MODIS)...
Purple line: MISR/SGM forest canopy height (m)
Blue line: US Forest Service Canopy Height (m)
random samples, screened for topographic shading
Mouseover the graph to stop scrolling
It's important to note that the Forest Service and MISR/GO maps were made using completely different methods and that the MISR/GO estimates of fractional woody plant cover and canopy height are not calibrated or scaled: they rely only on the geometric-optical model adjusted against MISR data.
- Mapping Carbon Pools in Desert Grasslands using EOS Multi-Angle Data
- Physical Structure of Desert Grasslands using Multiple View Angle Data from CHRIS
- Dramatic Changes in Urban Area in Inner Mongolia:
- Multi-angle remote sensing from the air and associated field data
- BRDF Applications in Semiarid Grassland Monitoring with the AVHRRs