EARTH OBSERVING

Catalog description

(Slashed with ESCI 42060 and ESCI 52060 ) Students are introduced to visible, thermal and LiDAR remote sensing methods. Visible and near infrared multispectral and hyperspectral data sets are used for a wide variety of research including land use change, water quality research and agricultural remote and proximal sensing. Thermal remote sensing can be used to characterize surface temperature changes, earth materials and thermal stresses on plants. LiDAR provides the ability to measure variations in surface topography and can “see” through clouds and jungle canopy and even penetrate aquatic environments to measure algal biomass and suspended sediment. Remote sensing is the use of instrumentation to obtain spectral and spatial information about an object or surface without direct contact. All matter interacts with electromagnetic energy through thermal emittance, absorption, transmittance, reflectance and/or scattering. Different materials have distinct electromagnetic signatures depending on their composition, structure and the nature of the energy with which the material is interacting. This course focuses primarily on multispectral and hyperspectral visible remote sensing, but the field of remote sensing makes use of information throughout the electromagnetic spectrum to sense the environment around us. Note that most of the data sets that are examined and analyzed in this course are multispectral Landsat images. Students are encouraged to explore various topics or geographic regions for their class project. It is recommended that students take an introductory GIS class prior to enrollment.