Economic, social, and environmental planning for a carbon-constrained future requires a capacity to monitor climate change impacts on vegetation and soil moisture at a level of detail that does not currently exist.
While radar measurements from satellites can provide this important information, the signals are confounded by complex interactions with the earth surface.
Specifically, terrain micro-topography, vegetation structure/ biomass, and the underlying soil moisture status, all interact together in an intricate way.
Using airborne radar data together with detailed ground measurements, models of this complex interaction will be developed and tested for subsequent time-series application to satellite data across Australia.
For further Project detail, see SMAPEx.
Highlights
Dr Rocco Panciera applied for a grant from the University of Melbourne to employ an early career researcher to enable himself and Dr Mihai Tanase to examine airborne lidar (laser) data in more depth for this Project. The application was successful, so the team are currently looking for a candidate who will start working with the Project for 6 months from early next year.
The Project team have made great progress and have just completed a month-long field campaign collecting data from 26th August – 26th September. This successful field campaign also involved numerous international organisations and the data that were collected will provide the basis for the rest of the Project.