First results towards building up a reliable in situ measurements database for LST algorithm validations using modular WSN: Northern Morocco campaigns case study

Abstract

Climate has changed throughout the 4.5 million year history of the globe. At the same time, natural and human activities are affected directly by the global change of Earth system attributes, such as increase in temperature. Land surface temperature (LST) is an important but highly variable climate parameter. Its spatial distribution and the characteristic of its diurnal change over wide areas can only be determined with remote-sensing methods. The power of wireless sensor network (WSN) technology has provided the capability of developing large-scale systems for remote-sensing algorithm and sensor validation.This article presents a new method (sensitivity ∼0.1 • C) for in situ LST measurements. The results of wide in situ LST campaigns carried out during 2009 in four distant and different sites located in northern Morocco are shown: (1) Kasr-Seghir, (2) Targha, (3) Tangier, and (4) Chefchaouen. For this purpose, we used two calibrated radiometers with thermal infrared bands, OSM101 and TESTO845. Finally, during these campaigns, a total of 28,531 measurements were made with the proposed wireless-LST (Wi-LST) system. The preliminary results show a wide variability of the measurements, which is in total accordance with the heterogeneity of the targets' nature. This is encouraging for we are interested in building up a reliable and consistent standard in situ LST measurements database for LST algorithm validations.

Coarse scale in situ albedo observations over heterogeneous snow-free land surfaces and validation strategy: A case of MODIS albedo products preliminary validation over northern China

“…However, this method is not suitable for the long-term albedo validation due to the high cost of field campaigns and the high temporal resolution of current sensors such as MODIS and VIIRS. In this paper, WSN technology was utilized to provide an automatic, intelligent and remote-controllable large-scale observation system for remote sensing product validation (Jin et al, 2012;Li et al, 2013;Raissouni et al, 2013).…”

Third International Symposium on Recent Advances in Quantitative Remote Sensing

“…The articles selected to appear in this special issue cover a very wide range of quantitative aspects of the use of remote sensing. The dominant areas include land surface temperature (Freitas et al 2013;Göttsche, Olesen, and Bork-Unkelbach 2013;Li et al 2013;Ouyang et al 2013;Qian, Li, and Nerry 2013;Raissouni et al 2013;Smith et al 2013;Sobrino et al 2013; Wu, Tang, and Li 2013). Other topics attracted some interest on atmospheric and meteorological studies (Boussetta et al 2013;Bravo-Aranda et al 2013;Campo et al 2013;Castellanos et al 2013;Pérez-Ramírez et al 2013;Segura et al 2013).…”