Earth system science related imaging spectroscopy—An assessment

The science of spectroscopy has existed for more than three centuries, and imaging spectroscopy for the Earth system for three decades. We first discuss the historical background of spectroscopy, followed by imaging spectroscopy, introducing a common definition for the latter. The relevance of imagi...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Remote sensing of environment 2009-09, Vol.113, p.S123-S137
Main Authors: Schaepman, Michael E., Ustin, Susan L., Plaza, Antonio J., Painter, Thomas H., Verrelst, Jochem, Liang, Shunlin
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
canopy reflectance
deciduous broadleaf forest
dynamic vegetation model
Earth System science
forest reflectance model
hyperspectral data
Hyperspectral imaging
Imaging spectrometry
Imaging spectroscopy
leaf-area index
radiative-transfer model
Remote sensing
remote-sensing applications
spectral mixture analysis
thematic mapper data
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Summary:The science of spectroscopy has existed for more than three centuries, and imaging spectroscopy for the Earth system for three decades. We first discuss the historical background of spectroscopy, followed by imaging spectroscopy, introducing a common definition for the latter. The relevance of imaging spectroscopy is then assessed using a comprehensive review of the cited literature. Instruments, technological advancements and (pre-)processing approaches are discussed to set the scene for application related advancements. We demonstrate these efforts using four examples that represent progress due to imaging spectroscopy, namely (i) bridging scaling gaps from molecules to ecosystems using coupled radiative transfer models (ii) assessing surface heterogeneity including clumping, (iii) physical based (inversion) modeling, and iv) assessing interaction of light with the Earth surface. Recent advances of imaging spectroscopy contributions to the Earth system sciences are discussed. We conclude by summarizing the achievements of thirty years of imaging spectroscopy and strongly recommend this community to increase its efforts to convince relevant stakeholders of the urgency to acquire the highest quality imaging spectrometer data for Earth observation from operational satellites capable of collecting consistent data for climatically-relevant periods of time.
ISSN:0034-4257
1879-0704
DOI:10.1016/j.rse.2009.03.001