Title :
Earth remote sensing technologies in the twenty-first century
Author :
Hartley, Jonathan
Author_Institution :
Earth Sci. Technol. Office, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, MD, USA
Abstract :
An Earth System Model of increasing capability and predictive power will depend on ever more sophisticated observing systems. These observing systems will require increased resolution in the spatial, spectral, radiometric, and temporal domains. There is a need for improvement of individual system capabilities and for the deployment of large numbers of sensors. Many new technologies will be required to accomplish this. Projecting decades into the future is difficult; however, because fundamental physical limits provide constraints on future progress, it is possible to outline the general form of the future remote sensing systems and the technologies they will rely on. Several trends are expected to continue far into the future: miniaturization and integration of electronics, increases in computational power, progress in large apertures, increases in transmitter power for active systems, miniaturization of optics, and increases in frequency tunability and flexibility. Ultimately, the size of an observing platform will be dictated solely by the physics of its parts. These technology challenges for future global Earth observation can best be met through the combined efforts of the international community.
Keywords :
Earth; geophysical techniques; remote sensing; Earth remote sensing; Earth system model; active systems; computational power; electronics integration; electronics miniaturization; frequency flexibility; frequency tunability; observing platform; observing systems; optics miniaturization; radiometric domain; remote sensing systems; spatial domain; spectral domain; temporal domain; transmitter power; Apertures; Earth; Optical computing; Optical transmitters; Power system modeling; Predictive models; Radiometry; Remote sensing; Sensor systems; Spatial resolution;
Conference_Titel :
Geoscience and Remote Sensing Symposium, 2003. IGARSS '03. Proceedings. 2003 IEEE International
Print_ISBN :
0-7803-7929-2
DOI :
10.1109/IGARSS.2003.1293863