Identifying drought-prone areas and developing an early warning system for crop damage. Protecting biologically diverse areas of the National Park System with a trail monitoring tool. Confirming flooded areas to better inform decision-makers during a disaster.
Each program area supports a variety of projects that utilize Earth observations to identify challenges around the world and create innovative solutions. Our portfolio demonstrates the benefits of using NASA Earth observations to enhance decision-making and improve life on Earth.
Sort by program area to find specific projects or explore them all below.
Principal Investigator
Neil Carter
Our collaborator and end-user, the US National Park Service (NPS), has policy and legislative mandates to conserve acoustic and night sky environments unimpaired for the enjoyment of future generations. The rapid and unprecedented spread of anthropogenic nightlight and noise (ANLN) across the contiguous US jeopardizes...
Principal Investigator
Gregory Okin
This is a four-year Applications Project in response to the ROSES 2016 Ecological Monitoring RFP. Specifically, this proposal addresses topic: Remote Sensing as a Catalyst for Large-scale Conservation. The University of California Los Angeles (UCLA) and the United States Geological Survey (USGS) have partnered with...
Principal Investigator
Gretchen Daily
Managing and monitoring biodiversity is a major challenge and opportunity for business, especially in rangelands, as one of the most heavily managed and often degraded natural systems that provides significant resources and raw materials for production. One of the largest and most threatened grasslands in...
Principal Investigator
Joaquim Goes
Over the past 15 years the Arabian Sea ecosystem has witnessed a radical shift in the composition of winter phytoplankton blooms due to the warming of the Eurasian continent and the spread of hypoxia. Recurrent and trophically important, winter diatom blooms until 1990s, have since...
Principal Investigator
Megan Donahue
The goal of the proposed research is to develop better models of coral disease outbreak risk across the western tropical Pacific Ocean and embed these improved forecasts into the NOAA Coral Reef Watch decision support system (DSS). The current DSS was developed based on ~50...
Principal Investigator
Matthew Reiter
Freshwater ecosystems contribute disproportionately to global biodiversity and ecosystem services but are highly threatened by climate change, drought, and unsustainable water use. In arid, semi-arid, and Mediterranean regions, landscape-scale conservation requires protection, management, and enhancement of the connectivity of dynamic wetland habitats through surface water...
Principal Investigator
Andrew J Hansen
Human activities are increasingly fragmenting intact habitats and reducing connectivity among protected areas. Concern about loss of biodiversity led to an international agreement in 2010 to meet 20 specific biodiversity targets. Among these, Target 5 deals with fragmentation, Target 11 with connectivity, and Target 17...
Principal Investigator
Chuanmin Hu
Floating mats of pelagic Sargassum macroalgae serve as an ecologically important habitat for many marine animals and therefore are regarded by the Sargasso Sea Commission as “the golden floating rainforest of the Atlantic Ocean.” On the other hand, excessive Sargassum beaching has become an increasing...
Principal Investigator
Kimberly Hall
Maintaining the ability of biota to move to suitable climates in response to climate change is now essential for biodiversity conservation. Identifying natural areas with diverse climatic options and enhancing connectivity among them has thus become a key climate adaptation strategy for The Nature Conservancy...
Principal Investigator
Andrew Elmore
There is wide recognition that sustainable forest management of eastern temperate forests requires a thoughtful and deliberate approach that seeks to balance various uses, resources, and values such as wildlife and aesthetic beauty, timber products, water purification, gas extraction, and a variety of recreational opportunities...