This book contains a selection of refereed papers presented at the 6 Specialist Meeting on Microwave Radiometry and Remote Sensing of the Environment held in Florence, Italy on March 15-18, 1999.
Over the last two decades, passive microwave remote sensing has made considerable progress, and has achieved significant results in the study of the Earth's surface and atmosphere. Many years of observations with ground-based and satellite-borne sensors have made an important contribution to improving our knowledge of many geophysical processes of the Earth's environment and of global changes. The evolution in microwave radiometers aboard satellites has increased steadily over recent years. At the same time, many investigations have been carried out both to improve the algorithms for the retrieval of geophysical parameters and to develop new technologies.
The book is divided into four main sections: three of these are devoted to the observation of the Earth's surface and atmosphere, and the fourth, to future missions and new technologies. The first section deals with the study of sea and land surfaces, and reports recent advances in remote sensing of ocean wind, sea ice, soil moisture and vegetation biomass, including electromagnetic modelling and the assimilation of radiometric data in models of land surface processes. The following two sections are devoted to the measurement of atmospheric quantities which are of fundamental importance in climatology and meteorology, and, since they influence radio-wave propagation, they also impact on several other fields, including geodesy, navigational satellite and radioastronomy. The last section presents an overview of new technologies and plansfor future missions.

Providing an authoritative assessment of the current landscape of spatial analysis in the social sciences, this cutting-edge Handbook covers the full range of standard and emerging methods across the social science domain areas in which these methods are typically applied. Accessible and comprehensive, it expertly answers the key questions regarding the dynamic intersection of spatial analysis and the social sciences. The chapters are split into insightful sections dedicated to foundational background material, methods, social science applications and the challenges on the horizon, using state-of-the-art coverage of the traditional and novel spatial methods. Leading scholars in the field use a range of applications to illustrate the diverse ways in which spatial analysis methods can inform research in the field of social sciences. Furthermore, the Handbook discusses the key challenges to that research including uncertainty, reproducibility and replicability. This Handbook of Spatial Analysis in the Social Sciences will be an excellent informative resource for scholars in the fields of geography, social sciences and public health. Established and early career researchers of the social sciences alike will appreciate the detailed overview of the methods and applications as well as the ability to expand their methodological knowledge.

Mastering ArcGIS Pro introduces the basic ideas behind GIS, teaching the concepts and skills needed to enter this rapidly evolving industry or use GIS in your current discipline. Based on the widely used ArcGIS software developed by Esri, Inc., this text integrates learning fundamental concepts with practicing software skills and is suitable for classroom use or for professionals studying independently.

Technological advancements have changed that way we think of traditional urban and spatial planning. The inclusion of conventional elements with modern technologies is allowing this field to advance at a rapid pace. Geospatial Technologies in Urban System Development: Emerging Research and Opportunities is a pivotal reference source for the latest research findings on the different tools and techniques ranging from mathematical sciences to spatial sciences which can be effective in unveiling the complexity of an urban system. Featuring extensive coverage on relevant areas such as urban traffic, remote sensing, and geographic information systems, this publication is an ideal resource for academics, researchers, graduate-level students, professionals, and policymakers in urban economy, regional planning, and information science disciplines.

While megacities are a reality, so too are the environmental disturbances that they cause, including air and water pollution. These disturbances can be modeled with technology and data obtained by modern methods, such as by drone, to monitor cities in near real-time as well as help to simulate risk situations and propose future solutions. These solutions can be inspired by the theoretical principles of sustainable urbanism. Methods and Applications of Geospatial Technology in Sustainable Urbanism is a collection of innovative research that combines theory and practice on analyzing urban environments and applying sustainability principles to them. Highlighting a wide range of topics including geographic information systems, internet mapping technologies, and green urbanism, this book is ideally designed for urban planners, public administration officials, landscape analysts, geographers, engineers, entrepreneurs, academicians, researchers, and students.

Geographic Information Systems GIS is a modern and effective technology to address developmental issues. All over the world, it is extensively used for resource management, environmental issues and policy decisions support systems with increasingly wider applications in agriculture, water resources development & management, veterinary sciences to disaster management. Being a new and interdisciplinary in nature, this interesting subject requires a lot of introductory textbook to improve understanding of the students. The author has put his teaching and research experience into good use and has brought out this concise and very readable book. With topics like: Hardware, software & liveware, recent developments Spatial and Map Projections and Database management, modeling, structuring, Networking, conversion and quality aspects finding their way in this book, which makes it worth reading for not only students but also for the teaching fraternity.

Over the past century, mechanization has been an important means for optimizing resource utilization, improving worker health and safety and reducing labor requirements in farming while increasing productivity and quality of 4F (Food, Fuel, Fiber, Feed). Recognizing this contribution, agricultural mechanization was considered as one of the top ten engineering achievements of 20th century by the National Academy of Engineering. Accordingly farming communities have adopted increasing level of automation and robotics to further improve the precision management of crops (including input resources), increase productivity and reduce farm labor beyond what has been possible with conventional mechanization technologies. It is more important than ever to continue to develop and adopt novel automation and robotic solutions into farming so that some of the most complex agricultural tasks, which require huge amount of seasonal labor such as fruit and vegetable harvesting, could be automated while meeting the rapidly increasing need for 4F. In addition, continual innovation in and adoption of agricultural automation and robotic technologies is essential to minimize the use of depleting resources including water, minerals and other chemicals so that sufficient amount of safe and healthy food can be produced for current generation while not compromising the potential for the future generation. This book aims at presenting the fundamental principles of various aspects of automation and robotics as they relate to production agriculture (the branch of agriculture dealing with farming operations from field preparation to seeding, to harvesting and field logistics). The building blocks of agricultural automation and robotics that are discussed in the book include sensing and machine vision, control, guidance, manipulation and end-effector technologies. The fundamentals and operating principles of these technologies are explained with examples from cutting-edge research and development currently going on around the word. This book brings together scientists, engineers, students and professionals working in these and related technologies to present their latest examples of agricultural automation and robotics research, innovation and development while explaining the fundamentals of the technology. The book, therefore, benefits those who wish to develop novel agricultural engineering solutions and/or to adopt them in the future.

GeoComputation and Public Health is fundamentally a multi-disciplinary book, which presents an overview and case studies to exemplify numerous methods and solicitations in addressing vectors borne diseases (e.g, Visceral leishmaniasis, Malaria, Filaria). This book includes a practical coverage of the use of spatial analysis techniques in vector-borne disease using open source software solutions. Environmental factors (relief characters, climatology, ecology, vegetation, water bodies etc.) and socio-economic issues (housing type & pattern, education level, economic status, income level, domestics' animals, census data, etc) are investigated at micro -level and large scale in addressing the various vector-borne disease. This book will also generate a framework for interdisciplinary discussion, latest innovations, and discoveries on public health. The first section of the book highlights the basic and principal aspects of advanced computational practices. Other sections of the book contain geo-simulation, agent-based modeling, spatio-temporal analysis, geospatial data mining, various geocomputational applications, accuracy and uncertainty of geospatial models, applications in environmental, ecological, and biological modeling and analysis in public health research. This book will be useful to the postgraduate students of geography, remote sensing, ecology, environmental sciences and research scholars, along with health professionals looking to solve grand challenges and management on public health.

Advancements in technology have paved the way for innovative developments in geographic information systems. This has led to the creation of new platforms for spatial analysis applications and strategies. Spatial Analysis Techniques Using MyGeoffice (R) is an information reference source for the latest academic material on emerging software developments for the exploration of spatial data and its various applications. Including a range of topics such as digital image processing, spatial autocorrelation, and system functionality, this book is ideally designed for researchers, engineers, academics, students, and practitioners seeking information on new technological progress in spatial analysis.