From deforestation to urbanization, the human footprint on the land surface is ever expanding, converting natural land covers into land uses or intensifying current land uses. Land use change results in loss of biodiversity, increased greenhouse gas emissions, and alteration of hydrological systems, among other impacts. Rates of land use change can be quantified using time-series earth observation data from satellites. The integrated use of multi-source data dramatically improves monitoring capabilities, reducing the uncertainties around many important land dynamics, such as deforestation rates and crop area estimation. In this talk, a number of themes will be presented with a focus on our improving capabilities to accurately quantify global land change.

Note to CSC and Statistics graduate students: these lectures have been approved to count toward the required seminars for graduate students.Please contact Laura Kroeger (lakroege@ncsu.edu) with any questions.