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.

 

Use of Remote Sensing Data to Improve Air Quality Decision Support Systems Used to Protect Public Health

Principal Investigator

Arastoo Pour Biazar

The proposed activity here addresses the Health and Air Quality Application Area. The project anticipates improving the accuracy of the Decision Support Tools (DSTs) used by health and air quality managers to meet the health effect standards set by the Clean Air Act (CAA). The...

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Coupling Earth observation data and ecohydrological modeling to predict disturbance-induced runoff and sedimentation for municipal water quantity and quality planning

Principal Investigator

Julie Padowski

Project Description: Fire disturbances in the Pacific Northwest (PNW) are projected to increase under a changing climate and are a major cause of increased erosion, runoff, suspended sediment, nutrient release, and debris flows in forested watersheds. Fire-related threats to water quality and quantity are of...

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High-Resolution Soil Moisture Monitoring for Improved Vineyard Water Resource Management

Principal Investigator

Wade T Crow

Description: This project seeks to provide high-resolution (i.e., daily, 30-m) soil moisture information to guide in-season irrigation decision support for vineyards equipped with variable-rate drip irrigation (VRDI) systems in the Central Valley of California. The primary water resource decision for these systems to when to...

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Decision and Information System for the Coastal waters of Oman (DISCO)- An Integrative Tool for Managing Coastal Resources under Changing Climate

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...
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Development of a Harmonized Multi-Sensor Global Active Fire Data Set

Principal Investigator

Louis Giglio

This proposal aims to advance a suite of active fire detection and characterization products derived from a network of geostationary satellite sensors, representing the first of its kind to undergo a comprehensive data validation and harmonization process. Geostationary satellite active fire detection was first proposed...
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Global Rapid Flood Mapping System with Spaceborne SAR Data

Principal Investigator

Sang-Ho Yun

According to the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies’ (IFRC’s) World Disasters Report 2015, on average, for the past decade, there have been floods somewhere in the world almost every other day. Earth-observing satellite remote sensing is needed to monitor global floods...
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Forecasting coral disease outbreaks across the tropical Pacific Ocean using satellite-derived data

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...
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Integrating Remote-Sensing and Ecological Forecasting into Decision-Support for Wetland Wildlife Management and Ecosystem Services in the Central Valley of California: Optimizing Across Multiple Benef

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...
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Integration of Earth Observations for Decision Making on Biodiversity Management and Conservation in Colombia: Consolidation of the Colombian Biodiversity Observation Network

Principal Investigator

Victor Gutierrrez-Velez

Earth Observations data and products represent great potential for understanding, managing, and conserving biodiversity. The ability of decision makers to translate this vast amount of data into information for practical decisions is constrained by differences in data structures, sources, and formats and the complexity of...
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Developing a Dynamic SPARROW Water Quality Decision Support System Using NASA Remotely-Sensed Products

Principal Investigator

Richard A Smith

SPARROW is widely used throughout the United States for long term, steady state water quality analysis. However, users are increasingly asking for a dynamic version of the model that can provide seasonal estimates of nutrients and suspended sediment to receiving waters. Time varying SPARROW forecasts...

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Completed Projects

Interested in our completed projects? View our project archive.