Category Archives: Remote sensing

Soil Moisture retrieval from satellite SAR imagery

Posted on June 19, 2017 by Stephen Burt

By Keith Morrison Soil moisture retrieval from satellite synthetic aperture radar (SAR) imagery uses the knowledge that the signal reflected from a soil is related to its dielectric properties. For a given soil type, variations in dielectric are controlled solely … Continue reading →

Posted in Climate, earth observation, Hydrology, land use, Measurements and instrumentation, Numerical modelling, Remote sensing | Tagged | Leave a comment

Observation uncertainty in data assimilation

Posted on March 20, 2017 by Stephen Burt

By Sarah Dance Approximately 4 million properties in the UK are at risk from surface-water flooding which occurs when heavy rainfall overwhelms the drainage capacity of the local area. Several national weather centres have been developing new numerical forecasting systems … Continue reading →

Posted in data assimilation, earth observation, Numerical modelling, Remote sensing, Weather, Weather forecasting | Leave a comment

Sea Surface Temperature Climate Data Record

Posted on February 13, 2017 by Stephen Burt

By Owen Embury Over 70% of the Earth’s surface is ocean and knowing its temperature is important for understanding both weather and climate. Historically sea surface temperature (SST) has been measured in situ – from ships and more recently from … Continue reading →

Posted in Climate, earth observation, Historical climatology, Measurements and instrumentation, Metadata, Remote sensing | Leave a comment

Lakes from space

Posted on December 12, 2016 by Stephen Burt

By Laura Carrea For the first time satellite technology has been used to make a census of global inland water cover. A number of 117 million lakes, reservoirs and wetlands of area >0.002 km2 have been found summing up to a … Continue reading →

Posted in earth observation, Hydrology, land use, Remote sensing | Tagged | Leave a comment

How TAMSAT have been supporting African people for over 35 years

Posted on December 5, 2016 by Stephen Burt

By Ross Maidment The University of Reading’s TAMSAT group ( www.tamsat.org.uk ) have helped pioneer the use of satellite imagery in rainfall estimation across Africa since the early 1980s when the group was first established. Thanks to some bright and innovative minds … Continue reading →

Posted in Africa, Climate, drought, earth observation, Remote sensing | Leave a comment

From kilobytes to petabytes for global change research: take the skills survey!

Posted on November 21, 2016 by Stephen Burt

By Vicky Lucas Institute for Environmental Analytics If you deal with megabytes of environmental sample data, or gigabytes of sensor data, or terabytes of model data or petabytes of remote sensing data, then I’d like you to take a survey.  … Continue reading →

Posted in Academia, Climate, Climate change, Climate modelling, Numerical modelling, Remote sensing, Teaching & Learning | Tagged | Leave a comment

The value of future observations

Posted on November 7, 2016 by Stephen Burt

By Alison Fowler The atmosphere and oceans are being routinely observed by a myriad of instruments. These instruments are positioned on board orbiting satellites, aircraft and ships, surface weather stations, and even balloons.  The information collected by these instruments can … Continue reading →

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The driving mechanism of large-scale unsteady currents in the ocean

Posted on February 1, 2016 by Stephen Burt

By Antoine Hochet During the last twenty years, measurements of the ocean surface properties by satellite instruments have significantly increased our knowledge of ocean dynamics. One of these instruments is an altimeter that measures the topography of the ocean surface … Continue reading →

Posted in earth observation, Oceans, Remote sensing | Tagged | Leave a comment

Is it possible to predict inter-annual changes in terrestrial water storage at regional scales?

Posted on January 18, 2016 by Stephen Burt

By Marie-Estelle Demory Our results say yes! It is possible to predict changes in terrestrial water storage, when the signal that drives the changes is strong enough. Here is an explanation. The hydrological cycle is a fundamental link between components of … Continue reading →

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Snowflakes – not just a pretty picture!

Posted on November 16, 2015 by Stephen Burt

By Chris Westbrook The slow, inexorable approach of Christmas means that Christmas adverts are now increasing in frequency at an incredible rate. Nauseating John Lewis offerings aside, we are going to be seeing a lot of snowflake-based imagery over the … Continue reading →

Posted in Remote sensing, University of Reading, Weather | Tagged | Leave a comment