Sciences and Exploration Directorate

Christopher S.R. Neigh

(RSCH AST, EARTH SCIENCES REMOTE SENS)

Christopher S.R. Neigh's Contact Card & Information.
Email: christopher.s.neigh@nasa.gov
Phone: 301.614.6681
Org Code: 618
Address:
NASA/GSFC
Mail Code 618
Greenbelt, MD 20771
Employer:
NASA

Missions & Projects

Brief Bio


Dr. Neigh's recent work has focused on quantifying regional forest disturbances and biomass using a suite of multispectral sensors, spaceborne and airborne LiDAR and sub-meter commercial satellite data to characterize the productivity, structure and carbon content of land surface vegetation. He has extensive experience evaluating vegetation greening and browning trends, mapping land-cover change/biomass and modeled the terrestrial carbon-cycle with disturbance.

Research Interests


Terrestrial Carbon Cycle

Earth Science: Carbon Cycle

My research contributes to NASA’s mission: ‘to advance and communicate scientific knowledge and understanding of the earth, the solar system, and the universe’. Two NASA earth science questions are at the center of my work: ‘How does the earth system respond to natural and human-induced changes?’ and ‘What are the consequences of change in the earth system for human civilization?’ To explore these questions, I conduct research in three areas: 1) data fusion to develop long term data records of vegetation dynamics for carbon cycle studies; 2) terrestrial ecosystem modeling of land-cover/land-use change in the context of impact to carbon storage; and 3) the development of models and methods that enable the quantification of the impact of climate change on ecosystem carbon storage. During the next five years, I plan to study and produce publications on the carbon consequences of land-cover/land-use change associated to agriculture production practices, fire, insect herbivory outbreaks, drought, climate warming impacting soil processes and plant productivity in a number of regions around the globe.


Disturbance Mapping

Earth Science: Remote Sensing

· Investigate long-term (greater than 25 years) global remote sensing observations and simulate net biome production (calculation of the total carbon balance including human initiated disturbances) at fine-scales.

· Combine multi-scale remote sensing observations, so that hotspots can be identified and processes understood to refine our uncertainties associated to the global carbon balance.


Biogeochemistry Modeling

Earth Science: Theory & Modeling

· Simulate ecosystem disturbance phenomena with biogeochemistry modeling to quantitatively understand dynamics is an emerging field with the advent of relatively inexpensive high powered computing and large quantities of remote sensing data.

· Understand spatio-temporal biosphere dynamics in ecosystem carbon balance assessments that were previously overlooked due to underlying inadequacies of available course resolution datasets and limited computing power.


Current Projects


Disturbance, Growth, and Recovery of Boreal Forests Spanning the Satellite Era: 3D Structure, Site Index, and Ecosystem Carbon Flux with Changing Climate

Vegetation & Soil

Climate change is altering vegetation productivity, dynamics, and C sequestration at continental scales across the higher northern latitudes. These shifts are reflected in changing vegetation canopy structure (cover and height), which varies from continuous forests of tall trees to discrete, isolated forest patches and evenly distributed expanses of growth-stunted trees. Although variation occurs at spatial scales not resolved by most earth-observing satellites due to local environmental factors, including terrain, winter snow and permafrost active layer depth, wind, and soil characteristics. Recent studies have found that Arctic greening is associated with densification of shrubs, increasing biomass, and establishment of new shrubs within thawing patterned ground features. However, they have not been sufficiently comprehensive to establish a map of growth potential for northern forests.

Understanding site-scale forest structure and its relation to environmental factors can improve broad-scale estimates of boreal C-flux. Previous studies have found large increases in productivity, but turnover rates in models remain a large source of uncertainty. Represented as in forestry as SI, site-specific estimates of forest growth potential will reduce this uncertainty in live C turnover into soil C pools. We propose to expand the NASA Global Forest Cover and Change (GFCC) dataset, correlate it with spatially explicit environmental data layers, and incorporate the relationships into DGVMs to understand environmental constraints on canopy structure and to predict impacts of environmental change on vegetation cover and C stock & flux.

With prior support from the NASA Carbon Cycle Science (CCS) program (13-CARBON13_2-0377 A high-resolution circumpolar delineation of the forest-tundra ecotone with implications for carbon balance), we have developed samples of canopy-cover and -height estimates from airborne LiDAR measurements and photogrammetric stereo image pairs. We have used these high-resolution reference datasets to calibrate and validate the NASA Earth Science Data Record (ESDR) of Global Forest Change (GFCC). These linear calibrations improved the accuracy of the GFCC global 30-m, annual resolution estimates of tree cover across the boreal biome and refined previous models and estimates of the location of the Taiga Tundra Ecotone (TTE). However, there is no pan-boreal, Landsat-resolution record of forest change from 1972 to 2000—a spatial and temporal scale needed to study the dynamics of slow-growing boreal forests.

The proposed study will develop a sample of reference data of > 10,000 sub-meter resolution stereo image pairs and use it to retrieve biome-wide estimates of forest stand age from the entire Landsat archive, from the 1970s until present. This extension of the disturbance record will enable modeling and analysis of forest growth and disturbance across a ~40-year chronosequence—the time span necessary for studying recent greening and browning trends. We will then pair the estimates of stand age, structure, and environmental factors into a chronosequence of SI across northern forests in order to understand local topographic and climatic effects on canopy structure and growth. Widely applied in forest ecology and silviculture, SI is an empirical estimate of forest productivity that reflects the effect of the local environment on vertical growth.

Our objectives are to:
1. Produce a stand-history/forest-age map: using a time-series of forest cover at annual, sub-hectare resolution spanning the entire Landsat archive pan-boreal, from 1972 to present;
2. Model and estimate forest growth potential: using a chronosequence of tree-canopy cover and height from samples of WorldView-1, 2, and 3 stereo imagery to estimate height-growth potential as the forest Site Index (SI); and
3. Estimate pan-boreal forest net C-flux: by incorporating stand age and SI into the Lund-Potsdam-Jena (LPJ) DGVM.

This study leverages our existing team (NASA GSFC and UMD GLCF) with three important resources: (1) access to sub-meter commercial satellite data, 2) NASA Ames stereo pipeline software, and 3) NASA GSFC & UMD GLCF supercomputing. All three aspects provide the means to estimate forest structure at sub-meter resolution and to map long-term, multi-decadal forest growth and productivity across the biome at sub-hectare resolution.

This proposal addresses NASA’s interest in C dynamics of Arctic-Boreal Terrestrial Ecosystems. Our findings will be significant sentinels of climate change and for developing confidence in predictions of changes in C balance due to a rapidly changing environment. Our work will contribute directly to NASA’s interests in characterizing critical ecosystems, especially in high latitudes, and can contribute data and science analysis to the proposed Arctic-Boreal Vulnerability Experiment (ABoVE). DGVMs that require SI and forest age structure can use these results to reduce currently large uncertainties in terrestrial C-flux estimates.


Automated protocols for generating very high-resolution commercial validation products with NASA HEC resources

Remote Sensing

The volume of sub-meter remotely sensed data is growing at rates exceeding petabytes per year. Over the past decade, costs for data storage systems and computing have both dropped exponentially. This has opened the door for “Big Data” processing using spaceborne optical imagery to characterize land surface phenomena in High-End Computing (HEC; acronyms list on page 21) environments. Recent examples include Google Earth Engine, Amazon Web Services ‒ Cloud Computing Services, NASA Earth Exchange and NASA Center for Climate Simulation (NCCS) Advanced Data Analytics Platform (ADAPT). At the same time, a growing constellation of commercial very-high-resolution (VHR) satellites offer global ~1-2-day repeat coverage that can complement NASA Earth Observing (EO) missions with stereo and super-spectral capabilities. Through no-direct-cost licensing agreements the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA) and NASA Goddard Spaceflight Center (GSFC) are acquiring petabytes of archived DigitalGlobe (DG) 0.3 ‒ 0.5 m panchromatic and 2 ‒ 4 m multi-spectral imagery from around the globe. The DG archive includes data from 7 satellites including WorldView-1, 2, 3, 4, Quickbird-2, GeoEye-1 and IKONOS-2. Prior to 2008, a limited number of EO VHR images were often used individually for evaluation and validation over small areas, to compare to coarser resolution NASA EO data because these data were snapshots in space and time. Now, the DG constellation enables repeat, contiguous coverage over large regions. These data are a valuable EO resource for scaling global ecological and geological phenomena occurring at sub-meter scales that can enhance NASA EO science that occurs at moderate to coarse resolutions. This proposal seeks to provide tools as an Application Program Interface (API) for mass processing spatially contiguous and temporally consistent archived NASA-GSFC DG VHR data that can only efficiently be performed on NASA HEC resources due to DG-NGA licensing limitations and computational requirements.

We will develop an API for generating VHR products to support NASA funded scientists and NASA EO missions that include two primary foci:

1) On Demand VHR Regional Mosaics ‒ Systematic ortho-rectified and co-registered multi-temporal, panchromatic 0.3 ‒ 0.5 m and unsharpened 2-m multi-spectral imagery compiled as user defined regional mosaics will allow for spatially continuous and temporally consistent reference. Such reference will provide an easily accessible calibration and evaluation dataset for NASA funded scientists. This work builds upon PI Neigh (http://cad4nasa.gsfc.nasa.gov) and Co-I’s Carroll, Slayback, Montesano, and Tucker’s experience in processing VHR data on GSFC’s NCCS ADAPT cluster. We will work with Co-I Lyapustin to generate surface reflectance data from VHR imagery over pseudo-invariant calibration sites for cross-calibration with Landsat and MODIS to minimize the effects of topography, view angle, date and time of day of collection. We will also develop a process for mosaicing and normalizing ortho-rectified images to create scientific data products useful for many NASA programmatic activities, including biodiversity, tree canopy closure, surface water fraction, and cropped area for smallholder agriculture among others.

2) On Demand VHR DEMs – Systematic processing of available along- and cross-track stereo VHR imagery to produce VHR Digital Elevation Models (DEMs) using the NASA Ames Stereo Pipeline open source software (https://ti.arc.nasa.gov/tech/asr/intelligent-robotics/ngt/stereo/). Co-I’s Shean, Alexandrov and Montesano will work together to apply a systematic DEM co-registration approach to generate products with < 0.5 ‒ 1.0 m horizontal and vertical accuracy that can support NASA missions and a number of different science programs. These include Earth surface studies within the Cryosphere (e.g., glacier mass balance, ice flow rates, snow depth), Hydrosphere (e.g., lake/water body levels, surface elevation dynamics, e.g., subsidence from groundwater depletion, thermokarst etc.), Biosphere (e.g., land-cover land-use-change, forest structure, canopy height/cover), and natural hazards (e.g., volcanoes, landslides, earthquakes among others).

NASA Earth Science has underutilized DG VHR imagery due to the “Big Data” infrastructure necessary but generally unavailable to individual NASA PIs. Successful development of a NASA HEC protocol to process VHR data could surmount the current VHR requirements of mass storage and parallel processing. DG VHR imagery requires baseline software and HEC to produce VHR products that will have broad benefits to NASA Earth Science programs.
 


High Mountain Asia and Beyond: Regional Changes in Climate, Glaciers and Water Resources

Hydrology / Water Cycle

Glacier mass loss in High Mountain Asia (HMA) may have far-reaching consequences for the region’s water resources. These changes in the HMA cryosphere are critical for the well-being of the people relying on the these freshwater resources in the vast downstream regions beyond the HMA itself. It is vital that such research be carried out now in order to allow us to estimate these transformations and to better arm the regional stakeholders with improved information and tools thus enabling improved planning and adaptation strategies. However the physical constraints, processes and dependencies of this unique climate-glacier-hydrology system are not well understood and large uncertainties of the glacio-hydrological response to future climate change remain due to the lack of detailed meteorological, glacier and hydrological data, the heterogeneity of climate processes, inaccessible terrain, and the topographical extreme relief. The proposed work aims to provide an integrated framework for the entire HMA region, suitable for understanding past changes in glacier mass and associated streamflow in response to climate change and for projecting those changes into the future combining extensive modeling with relevant glacier products from remote sensing.

Specifically we will a) use visible and radar remote sensing products to derive glacier volume changes, snow line altitudes and debris; b) apply a regional climate model with unprecedented spatial resolution to elucidate the regional-scale monsoon-driven climate dynamics with focus on precipitation patterns across the HMA region, c) model recent glacier changes and forecast future glacier evolution, and d) quantify the hydrological response to climate and glacier changes and forecast how those changes impact human water availability downstream of HMA. In addition we will develop and provide a rich set of integrated operational tools for assessing and forecasting regional-scale climate-driven glacier and hydrological changes for direct integration into the Glacial Melt Toolbox (GMELT) coordinated by NASA’s High Mountain Asia Team (HiMAT).

This project will, for the first time, integrate high-resolution modeling of the climate heterogeneity in HMA with regional-scale glacier hydrological modeling specifically adjusted to HMA and informed by a suite of observations from in-situ and satellite-derived data. High resolution stereo imagery from DigitalGlobe satellites will generate glacier volume change calculations, while Landsat, MODIS, ASTER, VIIRS, ALOS-PALSAR1/2 and Sentinel1/1b satellites will be used for snow cover, and glacier debris cover mapping over the glaciers, and GRACE data will inform glacier mass balance modeling. The project will foster collaboration between an interdisciplinary team of scientists from NASA, the University of Alaska and the University of New Hampshire with extensive experience in visible and radar remote sensing, high-resolution atmospheric modeling, glacier modeling, and regional-scale hydrological modeling.
 


Commercial Hi-res Data Distribution

Remote Sensing

The National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA), in partnership with the Civil Applications Committee (CAC), of which NASA is a member, provides access to its immense archive of unclassified commercial high-resolution satellite data to non-DOD government agencies under terms of its NextView contract.

The NextView contract stipulates that the data can be used by all branches, departments, and offices of the U.S. Government. With appropriate approval and acknowledgement, the data can also be shared with NGO's, state/local governments, Intergovernmental agencies, as well as universities, and foreign governments if the use is in support of U.S. government interests. Goddard Space Flight Center has been tasked with providing an interface to these data for NASA investigations and their teams. The NGA imagery licensed under NextView are made available via their Web-based Access and Retrieval Portal (WARP).


Land-cover/land-use change in southern Vietnam through the lenses of conflict, religion, and politics, 1980s to present

Land Cover/Use

Decades of conflict, colonialism, growing population, and global agriculture commercialization have resulted in land-cover/land-use change (LCLUC) on multiples spatial scales throughout Southeast Asia. These changes have had a profound impact on the ethnic minorities, particularly in southern Vietnam. Vietnam has experienced significant political, economic, and environmental change since the 1950s and the end of colonialism and French Indochina. All LCLUC in Vietnam must consider the impacts of the Vietnam War and subsequent regional and internal conflicts, the establishment of the one party government under the Communist Party of Vietnam, recent market and trade liberalization, and a complex religious and sociocultural tapestry. This project focuses on the Đồng Tháp and An Giang Provinces of the Mekong Delta region, which are home to some of Vietnam's largest ethnic minorities, including Khmers and Cham people. They are also home to a uniquely Vietnamese form of Buddhism, Hòa Hảo, which figures importantly in the modern history and landscape of the region. Hòa Hảo emphasizes the connection of an individual to the land in a relationship that is intimately ethical, spiritual, and national. The advent of the satellite era enables studies of the physical changes on the environment but to fully understand the trajectory of landscape change it is necessary to incorporate the social and religious factors endemic to the region.

We propose to map the changes and model the future trajectory of LCLUC by incorporating a sociocultural framework in a spatial modeling environment for the Mekong Delta region of southern Vietnam, with humanistic and sociological studies combined with very high resolution LCLUC in the Đồng Tháp and An Giang provinces. This project will map all agricultural, forest, and urban LCLUC around the Tràm Chim National Park in Đồng Tháp Province, agricultural areas in both provinces, and the two cities of Cao Lãnh, Đồng Tháp Province and Long Xuyên, An Giang Province using Landsat and very high resolution (VHR) Digital Globe data from NASA Commercial Archive Data for years 1985 to 2018. In year 3, the VHR LCLUC mapping will extend to the entire Mekong Delta region. This project will utilize decision tree algorithms within a data science approach to mine the Landsat archive and WorldView-1, -2, and -3 data on the large computing capacity of the Advanced Data Analytics Platform (ADAPT) at NASA GSFC’s NCCS (http://www.nccs.nasa.gov/services/adapt). Using a mixed methods approach of historical documentation, in-country interviews, qualitative method of cultural vignettes, and quantitative methods of socioeconomic development pathways, we will extract historical, current, and future land cover/land use change trajectories and theories of change. Historical documents will be retrieved in-country and from the U.S. Library of Congress. In addition to socioeconomic data, this project will focus on the impact of conflict, religion, and political changes on LCLUC. These sociocultural and socioeconomic variables are important given the complex religious, ethnic, and economic tapestry of the region. These theories of change will be used to create scenarios of future LCLUC mapped to Boolean grids (Swetnam et al., 2010) and tested against a Markov chain approach. GIS models of future LCLUC will combine the remote sensing-derived products with the spatially explicit theories of change and other suitability variables within geostatistical weighted models and tested against the large region. Working with our in-country collaborator, open source web visualization and Atlas.ti KML linked file will be created to display historical, current, and predicted spatially-explicit 10-30 m resolution LCLUC of these two provinces. All data products created in the project will be shared in collaboration with the NASA SERVIR-Mekong project led by Collaborator Potapov.


Prototyping MuSLI canopy chlorophyll content for assessment of vegetation function and productivity

Land Cover/Use

Land cover use practices and the ongoing human activities and climate changes have significantly affected agricultural and forest productivity by imposing severe and novel combinations of multiple stresses on the natural ecosystems. There is a strong need to develop an approach for quantifying the spateo-temporal changes in vegetation condition and photosynthetic function at moderate ground resolution (20-30 m) across large regional/continental/global scales. In the spring of 2015 ESA’s Sentinel-2 (S-2) satellite joined NASA’s Landsat-8 (L-8) in providing moderate-resolution, multispectral measurements with global extent, therefore increasing the temporal resolution of such data. We propose to use the recently developed homogenized L-8 and S-2 (HLS) high-frequency time series to develop a new canopy chlorophyll content product, and to evaluate the seasonal changes in land cover chlorophyll content and associated productivity for key agricultural crops, grasslands and forested ecosystems.

The key objectives of the proposed effort are to: 1) using in a seamless fashion the dense time series of HLS, L-8 and S-2 images to develop algorithms for estimating canopy chlorophyll (Chl) content; and 2) generate robust workflows and produce high density time series of land cover Chl products for major vegetation cover types (crops, grasslands and forests).

Earlier studies using individual Landsat scenes (e.g. Landsats TM and ETM+) were not able to detect the early stages in vegetation damage. Those studies only partially accounted for variations in atmospheric conditions, terrain elevation and illumination. Using the improved spectral resolution of the HLS L-8 and S-2 data (narrower red edge bands and additional blue, near-infrared, short-infrared and thermal bands), complemented with very high resolution (2 m) World View images/triplets to characterize canopy variations and structural effects, we will produce dense time series of vegetation indices and Chl products sensitive to the fine changes in chlorophyll content for improved monitoring of agricultural crops and forest biomass production.

To generate robust workflows, the algorithms will be tested, refined and validated at established research areas and instrumented sites representing major agricultural crops and forested ecosystems. We will use the L-8 thermal bands (TIRS1) to quantify the effects from changes in Chl content and vegetation damage on agricultural and forest productivity, comparing the phenology trends in canopy Chl, TIRS1 and ecosystem primary production, as measured at the sites. By analyzing these coupled dense time series, we will provide
essential information about the major biophysical drivers of vegetation health and function.
This effort leverages the ongoing international collaborations between USA and European Union researchers, which will provide expertise and satellite imagery available at their organizations as well as field spectral data obtained from established sites with ongoing field data collections. The proposed work directly supports the goals of NASA’s LCLUC program, to further "develop the capability for periodic satellite-based inventories of land cover, and monitoring and characterizing land-cover and land-use change." This effort provides a significant step forward towards developing an approach and tools for evaluation of vegetation health and photosynthetic function at 30 m resolution, that will enhance our ability to identify the drivers and quantify the rates of land cover change for critical vegetation types across the globe. This enhanced capability will greatly improve the information available for timely management decisions that have potential to reduce the associated agricultural, economic and climate impacts of environmental and anthropogenic factors.

Positions/Employment


Physical Research Scientist

NASA - NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Biospheric Sciences Laboratory

October 2010 - Present

 • Serves as a specialist that analyzes, interprets, and quantifies terrestrial disturbance impacts from natural events of fire, insect outbreak, and anthropogenic land-cover land-use change characterizing dynamics to identify and understand the distribution of sources and sinks of carbon in Northern Hemisphere ecosystems;
• Conducts physical science studies with remote sensing datasets obtained from space and complimented by airborne and ground-based measurements suitable for assimilation into numerical biogeochemistry simulations to develop empirical, theoretical, or experimental means to understand terrestrial disturbance processes relevant to ecosystem carbon cycling;
• Reviews, advises on, and conducts complex analysis of vegetation mapping integration into terrestrial carbon cycling simulations to quantify ecosystem responses to climate change, estimating trace gas fluxes from natural and human managed systems that are critical biophysical processes associated to vegetation productivity and ecosystem carbon storage;
• Documents and reports study results to the public and serves as authoritative source of consultation.


NASA Post-doctoral Fellow

Oak Ridge Associated Universities - NASA-GSFC

May 2010 - October 2010

 • Served as a specialist that analyzed, interpreted, and quantified terrestrial disturbance impacts from natural events of fire, insect outbreak, and anthropogenic land-cover land-use change characterizing dynamics to identify and understand the distribution of sources and sinks of carbon in Alaskan ecosystems;
• Documented and reported study results to the public.


Senior Research Scientist

Science Systems Applications Inc. - Greenbelt, Maryland

July 2001 - May 2010

 • Analyzed, interpreted, space based empirical measurements of human and natural disturbances to vegetation productivity and structure using multi-temporal multi-spectral satellite data to derive biophysical information to investigate trace gas emissions related to North America terrestrial carbon cycling;
• Planed, obtained, coordinated and implemented multi-temporal multi-spectral ground and satellite information for numerical model-data fusion of biogeochemistry simulations to quantify, improve, and discover the nature, magnitude, and distribution of terrestrial carbon sinks and sources that impact ecosystem carbon balance;
• Produced proposals and scientific manuscripts suitable for peer review and publication.


Applications Scientist

MDA Federal (Formerly Earth Satellite Corporation) - Gaithersburg, Maryland

April 1996 - July 2001

 • Conducted physical science studies through analysis of multi-temporal multi-spectral mapping of land-cover land-use change of vegetation and forest cover dynamics with orthorectified Landsat Thematic Mapper (TM) and Landsat Multispectral Scanner (MSS) remote sensing data;
• Coordinated and integrated development, oversight and scheduling of selection, acquisition, processing, and error estimation of global Landsat Multispectral Scanner (MSS) data for the GeoCover Ortho NASA project from U.S. and foreign ground stations.

Teaching Experience


2009 Lecturer
Department of Geography, University of Maryland College Park
Course: Introduction to Remote Sensing
Undergraduate Level, 3 Credits, 47 Students.
Taught overview of remote sensing instruments, data acquisition, and applications. Constructed and implemented course content including: syllabus; bi-weekly lectures; pop quizzes; midterm; and final examination.

2006 Adjunct Instructor
Department of History, Global Studies and Geography, Coppin State University
Course: Introduction to Remote Sensing
Undergraduate Level, 3 Credits, 12 Students.
Taught overview of remote sensing instruments, data acquisition and applications. Constructed and implemented course content including: syllabus; bi-weekly lectures; laboratory assignments; student projects; midterm; and final examination.

2004 Guest Lecturer
Department of Geography, George Washington University,
Course: Introduction to Remote Sensing (Undergraduate Level, 3 Credits)
Taught overview of long-term land remote sensing measurements of vegetation response to climate variability.

2007 On the Cutting Edge, University of Wisconsin, Madison
Attended a three day workshop for becoming an affective faculty member.

2006 Preparing Future Faculty Summer Institute, (AGEP), Howard University
Attended a one-week intensive meeting for developing effective teaching pedagogies, syllabi, and mentoring interactions with students.

Education


2003 – 2008 Doctor of Philosophy in Geography, Ecosystem Carbon Dynamics Specialty
University of Maryland, College Park, Maryland
Dissertation: Identifying and Understanding North American Carbon Cycle Perturbations from Anthropogenic and Natural Disturbances: 1982 – 2005
Co advisors: Compton J. Tucker and John R.G. Townshend

2000 – 2002 Master of Arts in Geography, Vegetation Response to Climate Specialty
University of Maryland, College Park, Maryland
Scholarly Paper in requirement of Master of Arts Degree: Newfoundland Vegetation Trends: Linkages between Temperature and NDVI
Advisor: John R.G. Townshend

1994 – 1998 Bachelor of Science in Geography, Cartography Specialty
University of Maryland, College Park, Maryland
Advisor: Shunlin Liang

Professional Societies


American Association for the Advancement of Science, (AAAS)

2008 - Present


American Geophysical Union, (AGU)

2004 - Present


American Society for Photogrammetry and Remote Sensing, (ASPRS)

2004 - Present


Association for American Geographers, (AAG) Mid Atlantic Division

Treasurer 2006 - 2008

2004 - 2010

Professional Service


2011 – Present, Manager of DigitalGlobe sub-meter data distribution to NASA funded PIs. 

2010 – Present, Mentor for the NASA Undergraduate Student Research Program (USRP).

2005 – 2008, Treasurer for the Middle Atlantic Association for American Geographers.

2004 – 2006, Peer mentor for the University of Maryland’s Promise Program.

2004 – 2005, University of Maryland Department of Geography Search Committee for Assistant/Associate Professor of Geographic Information Science. Graduate student representative.

Awards


2019 NASA HQ Team Excellence Award

2014 - 2019 NASA Ratings Based Award

2012 NASA Ratings Based Award

2011 NASA Time off Award

2010 NASA Post-doctoral Fellow

2007 NCAR AIMES (Analysis, Integration and Modeling of the Earth System) Young Scientist Network (YSN)

2000 – 2002 University of Maryland Block Grant Fellow

Grants


Advanced information systems to fill STV gaps: next-generation stereo+lidar fusion and sensor technology - NASA ESTO DECADAL SURVEY INCUBATION PROGRAM: SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY (NNH21ZDA001N-DSI) - Awarded: 2022-08-01


Dates: 2022-08-01  - 2025-07-31

Coverage: 0.1


The Impact of Investment on Irrigated Rice, Dryland Agriculture and Afforestation in Senegal using SAR and Optical Time-Series Imagery in Data Fusion Approaches

The Impact of Investment on Irrigated Rice, Dryland Agriculture and Afforestation in Senegal using SAR and Optical Time-Series Imagery in Data Fusion Approaches - NASA LCLUC - Awarded: 2021-01-01


Dates: 2021-01-01  - 2023-12-31

Coverage: 0.2


Towards a Warmer, Less Frozen Future Arctic: Ecosystem Impacts, Drivers, and Societal Responses Along Bioclimatic Gradients in Western Alaska - NASA Terrestrial Ecology ABoVE (NNH21ZDA001N-TE) - Awarded: 2022-05-01


Dates: 2022-10-01  - 2025-09-30

Coverage: 0.1


Mapping boreal forest biomass recovery rates across gradients of vegetation structure and environmental change

Mapping boreal forest biomass recovery rates across gradients of vegetation structure and environmental change - NASA Terrestrial Ecology ABoVE (NNH21ZDA001N-TE) - Awarded: 2022-05-01


Dates: 2022-10-01  - 2025-09-30

Coverage: 0.05

Talks, Presentations and Posters


Invited

Neigh C.S.R., Montesano P.M., Sexton J.O., Feng M., Channan S., Wooten M., Wagner W. and Poulter B. (2018) Satellite Estimates of Young North American Boreal Forest Site-Index from DGVMs. Invited oral presentation conducted at ForestSAT in College Park, Maryland.

November 5, 2018


Neigh C.S.R. and Montesano P.M. (2018) High Volume Processing of WorldView Images. Oral presentation conducted at the Circumpolar Remote Sensing Symposium’s Big Data Workshop in Potsdam Germany.

October 14, 2018


Neigh C.S.R., Carroll M., Wooten M., Powell B., McCarty J., Husak G., Enenkel M., Hain C., McCorkel J., Campbell P., Ong L., Ly V., Landis D., Fry S., Middleton E., Montesano P.M., Sexton J.O., Feng M., Channan S., Wagner W. and Poulter B. (2018) Emerging NASA Earth Science Opportunities with Very High-Resolution Commercial Imagery and Cloud Computing. Invited oral presentation conducted at Miami University, Oxford Ohio.

October 26, 2018


Neigh C.S.R., Carroll, M.L., Wooten M.R., McCarty, J.L., Powell, B.F., Husak, G.J., Enenkel, M., and Hain, C.R. (2017) Sub-hectare crop area mapped wall-to-wall in Tigray Ethiopia with HEC processing of WorldView sub-meter panchromatic image texture. Invited oral presentation conducted at the annual fall meeting of the American Geophysical Union in New Orleans, Louisiana.

13, 2017


Neigh, C.S.R., Nickeson, J., and Quarter, S. (2011). Beta testing hi-res commercial data distribution to the Land-Cover Land-Use Change community. Invited oral presentation conducted at the NASA carbon cycle and ecosystems Joint Science Workshop Land Cover Land-Use Change Science Team Meeting at the Alexandria Mark Center, Alexandria Virginia.

May 12, 2011


Neigh, C.S.R. (2010). Application of AVHRR for goose nesting biogeography: potential benefits and pitfalls. Invited oral presentation conducted at the USGS Powell Center, Fort Collins, Colorado.

October 10, 2010


Other

Neigh C.S.R., Montesano P.M., Sexton J.O., Feng M., Channan S., Carvalhais N., Forkel M., Calle L. and Poulter B. (2018) 3D Satellite Observations of North American Boreal Forest Growth. Oral presentation conducted at the Circumpolar Remote Sensing Symposium in Potsdam, Germany.

October 13, 2018


Neigh C.S.R., Carroll M.C., Montesano P.M., Slayback D., Lyapustin A., Tucker C.J., Shean D., Alexandrov O., Macander M. (2018) Enhanced Very-High Resolution (EVHR) Products for NASA’s Earth Science Investigators. Oral presentation conducted at the Earth Science Technology Forum (ESTF) in Silver Spring, Maryland.

July 14, 2018


Neigh C.S.R., Carroll M., Montesano P.M., Slayback D., Shean D., Macander M., Lyapuston A., Alexandrov O., and Tucker C.J. (2018) Generating Enhanced Very-High Resolution Products with NASA High-End Computing. Poster presentation conducted at the annual Biodiversity and Ecological Forecasting team meeting in Washington D.C.

May 25, 2018


Neigh C.S.R., Carroll, M.L., Montesano, P., Slayback, D., Wooten, M., Lyapustin, A., Shean, D., Alexandrov, O., Macander, M. and Tucker, C.J. (2017) Automated protocols for spaceborne sub-meter resolution “Big Data” products for Earth Science. Oral presentation conducted at the annual fall meeting of the American Geophysical Union in New Orleans, Louisiana.

12, 2017


Montesano P.M., Neigh, C.S.R., Feng, M., Channan, S., Sexton, J.O., Wagner, W., Wooten, M., Poulter, B., and Wang, L. (2017) Identifying forest patterns from space to explore dynamics across the circumboreal. Poster presentation conducted at the annual fall meeting of the American Geophysical Union in New Orleans, Louisiana.

12, 2017


Osmanoglu, B., Hock, R., Lammers, R.B., Nicholls, S., Montesano, P.M., Neigh, C.S.R., Frolking, S.E., Grogan, D.S., Rounce, D., and Proussevitch, A.A. (2017) Downstream impacts if climate induced glacier change in High Mountain Asia. Poster presentation conducted at the annual fall meeting of the American Geophysical Union in New Orleans, Louisiana.

13, 2017


Wooten, M., Neigh, C.S.R., Carroll, M. and McCarty J.L. (2017) Semi-automated Approach to Mapping Sub-hectare Agriculture Fields using Very High Resolution Data in a High-Performance Computing Environment. Poster presentation conducted at the annual fall meeting of the American Geophysical Union in New Orleans, Louisiana.

13, 2017


Lagomasino, D., Cook, B., Fatoyinbo, T., Morton, D.C., Montesano, P.M., Neigh, C.S.R., Wooten, M., Gaiser, E. and Troxler, T. (2017) Using High-Resolution Imagery to Characterize Disturbance from Hurricane Irma in South Florida Wetlands. Poster presentation conducted at the annual fall meeting of the American Geophysical Union in New Orleans, Louisiana.

13, 2017


Montesano P.M., Neigh C.S.R. and Wagner W. (2017) Lidar validation of boreal forest structure from space borne stereogrammetry. Poster presentation conducted at SilviLaser 2017 in Blacksburg Virginia.

November 15, 2017


Neigh C.S.R., Montesano P.M., Sexton J.O., Feng M., Channan S., Ranson K.J. and Townshend .J (2017) Reduced uncertainty of 30 m North American Boreal Forest Cover. Poster presentation conducted at the North American Carbon Program meeting in North Bethesda Maryland.

April 29, 2017


Montesano P.M., Neigh C.S.R., Sun G., Duncanson L., Van Den Hoek J., Ranson J., (2017) Forest height in open canopies from spaceborne sterogrammetry. Poster presentation conducted at the North American Carbon Program meeting in North Bethesda Maryland.

April 29, 2017


Neigh C.S.R., Montesano P.M., Sexton J.O., Feng M., Channan S., Poulter B., Masek J., Duffy D., Forkel M. and Carvalhais N. (2017) Boreal Forest 3D Structure, Site-Index, and Ecosystem C-Flux. Oral presentation conducted at the ABoVE annual science team meeting in Boulder, Colorado.

February 19, 2017

Neigh C.S.R., Montesano P.M., Sexton J.O., Feng M., Channan S., Poulter B., Masek J., Duffy D., Forkel M. and Carvalhais N. (2017) Boreal Forest 3D Structure, Site-Index, and Ecosystem C-Flux. Oral presentation conducted at the ABoVE annual science team meeting in Boulder, Colorado.


Carrol, M.L., Neigh, C.S.R., Wooten, M.R., Husak, G.J., McCarty J.L., Powell, B.F., Enkel, M., Hain, C.R., Anderson, M.C., Osgood, D.E. (2016) Mapping and monitoring small stakeholder agriculture in Tigray, Ethiopia using sub-meter Worldview and Landsat imager and high performance computing.  Poster presentation conducted at the annual American Geophysical Union meeting in San Francisco, California.

16, 2016


Franks, S., Neigh, C.S.R., ,and Middleton E. (2016) ALI and Landsat spectral sensitivity to detect an Eastern Larch tree mortality event in Park Falls Wisconsin, USA. Poster presentation conducted at ForestSAT in Santiago, Chile.

December 14, 2016


Neigh C.S.R., Montesano P.M., Sexton J.O., Feng M., Ranson K.J., Channan S., Chopping M. and Townshend J.R.G. (2016) Delineating the Taiga-Tindra Ecotone with Landsat, LiDAR and Spaceborne Sub-meter Imagery. Oral presentation conducted at the International Circumpolar Remote Sensing Symposium in Homer, Alaska.

October 15, 2016


Neigh C.S.R., McCorkel J., Campbell P., Ong L., Landis D., Fry S., and Middleton E. (2016) Characterizing EO-1 Hyperion Stability in Psuedo Invariant Calibration Sites. Oral presentation conducted at the HyspIRI data products symposium at the NASA Goddard Spaceflight Center, Greenbelt, Maryland.

July 1, 2016


Neigh C.S.R., Montesano P.M., Sexton J.O., Feng M., Ranson K.J., Channan S., and Townshend J.R.G. (2016) Reducing Uncertainty in Delineating the Taiga Tundra Ecotone. Oral presentation conducted at the European Space Agency Living Planet Symposium in Prague Czech Republic.

June 12, 2016


Neigh, C.S.R., Franks S., Nickeson J., Slayback D. and Tucker C. (2016) DigitalGlobe Data Availability to LCLUC Scientists. Poster presentation conducted at the NASA Land Cover Land Use Change Science team meeting in Bethesda, Maryland.

May 15, 2016


Neigh C.S.R., McCorkel J., Campbell P.K.E., Ong, L., Ly, V., Landis, D., and Middleton E.M., (2016). Monitoring orbital precession of EO-1 Hyperion with three atmospheric correction models in the Libya-4 PICS, SPIE Baltimore, MD, USA.

May 20, 2016


Neigh C.S.R., McCorkel J., Campbell P., Ong L., Landis D., Ly V., Fry S., and Middleton E. (2014) Monitoring Hyperion stability and sub-pixel heterogeneity in a pseudo-invariant desert site. Oral presentation conducted at the JACIE workshop in Tampa, Florida.

June 6, 2015


Rishmawi K., Masek J., Zhao F.A., Neigh C.S.R., and Huang C., (2015) Measuring post-disturbance forest regrowth in North and South Carolina using 28-years of Landsat data. Poster presentation conducted at the Carbon Cycle and Ecosystems Joint Science Workshop in College Park, Maryland.

May 23, 2015


Montesano P., Neigh C.S.R., Sexton J., Feng M., Chopping M., Channon S., Nelson R.F., Townshend J., Ranson K.J. (2015) Calibrating Spaceborne Esitmates of Tree Cover in the Taiga-Tundra Ecotone. Poster presentation conducted at the Carbon Cycle and Ecosystems Joint Science Workshop in College Park, Maryland.

May 23, 2015


Neigh, C.S.R., Brown M., Osgood D., McCarty J., Mann B., Husak G., Anderson M., Hain C., Greatrex H. (2015) Linking remote sensing and climate data for an agriculture index insurance program in Ethiopia. Poster presentation conducted at the Carbon Cycle and Ecosystems Joint Science Workshop in College Park, Maryland.

May 23, 2015


Neigh, C.S.R., Nickeson J., Slayback D., Franks S., Yuan K., and Tucker C. (2015) DigitalGlobe High Resolution Data Access for LCLUC Scientists. Poster presentation conducted at the Carbon Cycle and Ecosystems Joint Science Workshop in College Park, Maryland.

May 23, 2015


Ranson, K.J., Sun G., Montesano P., Neigh C.S.R., and Kharuk V. (2015) Taiga-Tundra Ecotone Structure Studies. Poster presentation conducted at the Carbon Cycle and Ecosystems Joint Science Workshop in College Park, Maryland.

May 23, 2015


Montesano P., Neigh C.S.R., Sexton J., Feng M., Chopping M., Channon S., Nelson R.F., Townshend J., Ranson K.J. (2015) Validation of Landsat-derived Tree Cover Estimates in the Taiga-Tundra Ecotone. Poster presentation conducted at the North American Carbon Program meeting in Washington, DC.

February 27, 2015


Neigh C.S.R., Masek J., Bourget P., Rishmawi K., Zhao F., Huang C., Cook B., and Nelson R. (2014) Regional rates of US forest regeneration measured from annual Landsat disturbance history and IKONOS stereo imagery. Oral presentation conducted at the annual meeting of the American Geophysical Union in San Francisco, California.

15, 2014

 


Neigh C.S.R., Masek J., Bourget P., Rishmawi K., Zhao F., Huang C., Cook B., and Nelson R. (2014) Regional rates of US forest regeneration measured from annual Landsat disturbance history and IKONOS stereo imagery. Oral presentation conducted at ForestSAT in Riva del Garda, Italy.

December 7, 2014

 


Neigh C.S.R., Nelson R.F., Ranson K.J., Margolis H., Montesano P., Sun G., Kharuk V., Næsset E. , Wulder M.A., and Andersen H.E. (2014) Mapping the distribution of circumpolar forest carbon with field measurements, airborne and spaceborne LiDAR. Oral presentation conducted at the International Arctic Remote Sensing Symposium in Reykjavik, Iceland.

October 10, 2014

 


McCorkel J., Ong L., Neigh C.S.R., Thome K. Ungar S., and Middleton E. (2014) Continued EO-1 Hyperion calibration performance. Poster presentation conducted at IGARRS in Quebec, Canada.

August 15, 2014


Neigh C.S.R., McCorkel J., Campbell P., Ong L., Landis D., Fry S., and Middleton E. (2014) Monitoring Hyperion stability and sub-pixel heterogeneity in a pseudo-invariant desert site. Oral presentation conducted at the HyspIRI data products symposium at NASA Goddard Spaceflight Center, Greenbelt, Maryland.

July 6, 2014

 


Forkel M., Carvalhais N., Verbesselt J., Mahecha M., Neigh C.S.R., Thonicke K. and Reichstein M. (2014) Trend change detection in NDVI time series: Contrasting methodologies, data sets and global vegetation models. Poster presentation conducted at the European Geophysical Union in Vienna, Austria.

June 1, 2014


Neigh C.S.R., Nelson R.F., Ranson K.J., Margolis H., Montesano P., Sun G., Kharuk V., Næsset E. , Wulder M.A., and Andersen H.E. (2013) Taking stock of circumboreal forest carbon with ground measurements, airborne and spaceborne LiDAR. Oral presentation conducted at the annual meeting of the American Geophysical Union in San Francisco, California

8, 2013

 


Neigh, C.S.R., Nelson, R., Ranson, R., Sun, G., Montesano, P., and Margolis, H. Kharuk V., Næsset E. Wulder M., Andersen H. (2013) Taking stock of circumboreal forest carbon with spaceborne LiDAR. Poster presentation conducted at the NASA North American Carbon Program meeting in Albuquerque, New Mexico.

June 15, 2013

 


Neigh, C.S.R., Nickeson, J., Tucker, C.J., Franks S., Yuan K., and Quarter, S. (2013) High Resolution Commercial Data Open for LCLUC Scientists. Poster presentation conducted at the NASA Land Cover Land Use Change Science team meeting in Rockville, Maryland.

May 6, 2013

 


Neigh, C.S.R., Nelson, R., Ranson, R., Sun, G., Montesano, P., and Margolis, H. Kharuk V., Næsset E. Wulder M., Andersen H. (2013) Taking stock of circumboreal forest carbon with spaceborne LiDAR. Poster presentation conducted at the NASA Terrestrial Ecology meeting in La Jolla, California.

March 6, 2013

 


Neigh, C.S.R., Masek, J., Bourget P., Rishmawi K., and Diabate M. (2012) Evaluating the Ability to Monitor Eastern U.S. Forest Regrowth with IKONOS Stereo Imagery and Landsat Disturbance History. Poster presentation conducted at the annual American Geophysical Union meeting in San Francisco, California.

9, 2012

 


Neigh, C.S.R., Nickeson, J., and Quarter, S. (2012) High Resolution Commercial Data Archive: Access for LCLUC Scientists. Poster presentation conducted at the NASA Land Cover Land Use Change Science team meeting in Rockville, Maryland.

May 8, 2012

 


Neigh, C.S.R., Nelson, R., Sun, G., Ranson, J., Montesano, P., and Margolis, H. (2011). Moving toward a Biomass Map of Boreal Eurasia based on ICESat GLAS, ASTER GDEM, and field measurements: Amount, spatial distribution, and Statistical Uncertainties. Oral presentation conducted at the annual meeting of the American Geophysical Union in San Francisco, California.

7, 2011

 


Neigh, C.S.R., Nelson, R., Sun, G., Ranson, R., Montesano, P., and Margolis, H. (2011) Progress in Estimating Boreal Eurasia Biomass Based on ICEsat GLAS, ASTER GDEM, and Field Measurements. Poster presentation conducted at the NASA carbon cycle and ecosystems Joint Science Workshop at the Alexandria Mark Center, Alexandria Virginia.

May 13, 2011

 


Neigh, C.S.R., Carvalhais, N., G.J. Collatz, D. Bolton, J Williams, M. Diabate and C.J. Tucker (2011) A Multi-sensor approach to constrain long-term forests NPP decline dynamics in North America. Poster presented at NASA’s North American Carbon Program Meeting, New Orleans, Louisiana.

March 14, 2011

 


Neigh, C.S.R., Williams, J.J., Bolton D.K., Diabate M., and Tucker, C.J. (2010). Multi-resolution long-term satellite observations of declines in photosynthetic capacity: Constraining abiotic and biophysical disturbances to plant productivity in North America. Oral presentation conducted at the annual meeting of the Association of American Geographers, Washington, D.C.

June 15, 2010

 


Carvalhais, N., Reichstein, M., Collatz, G.J., Mahecha, M., Migliavacca, M., Neigh, C.S.R., Seixas, Julia, and Tomelleri, E. (2009). Implications of the ecosystem steady state assumption for NEP estimates from site level to regional scales. Poster presented at the International Carbon Dioxide Conference (ICDC8), Jena, Germany.

October 16, 2009

 


Neigh, C.S.R., Carvalhais, N., and Collatz, G. J. (2009). Modeled Implications of North American Cropland Carbon Balance from Land-Use Change Observed from Long-Term Multi-Resolution Satellite Imagery. Poster presented at the International Carbon Dioxide Conference (ICDC8), Jena, Germany.

October 15, 2009

 


Neigh, C.S.R., Carvalhais, N., Collatz, G. J., and Tucker C.J. (2009). Carbon Consequences of Regional Land Cover Changes in North America. Poster presented at the North American Carbon Program (NACP), All Investigators meeting, San Diego, California.

March 26, 2009

 


Neigh, C.S.R., (2008). Climate Change Implications to Vegetation Production in Alaska. Poster presented at the American Geophysical Union (AGU) Fall meeting, San Francisco, California.

12, 2008

 


Neigh, C.S.R., Carvalhais, N., Collatz, G. J., and Tucker C.J. (2008). Midwest Agriculture Land Cover Change Implications to North American Carbon Balance 1982 – 2005. Poster presented at NASA’s Joint workshop on Carbon and Ecosystems, University of Maryland University College, College Park, Maryland.

2008

 


Neigh, C.S.R., Carvalhais, N., and Collatz, G.J.  (2007). Carbon Consequences of Positive NDVI Anomalies in North America. Poster presented at the American Geophysical Union (AGU) Fall meeting, San Francisco, California.

2007

 


Neigh, C.S.R., Tucker, C.J., Collatz, G.J., and Townshend, J.R.G. (2006). Carbon Consequences of Regional North American Land Cover Disturbances. Poster presentation conducted at Recent Advances in Quantitative Remote Sensing (RAQARS), Valencia, Spain.

October 2006

 


 Neigh, C.S.R., Tucker, C.J., Collatz, G.J. and Townshend, J.R.G. (2006). Observed and Simulated North American Land Cover Disturbances: 1982-2005. Poster presented at the American Geophysical Union (AGU) Fall meeting, San Francisco, California.

2006

 


Neigh, C.S.R., Tucker, C.J., Townshend, J.R.G. and Collatz, G.J. (2006). 30 Years of Disturbances to Ecosystem Functioning in North America. Poster presentation conducted at South East division joint meeting with the Middle Atlantic division of the American Association of Geographers (SEDMADAAG), Morgantown, West Virginia.

2006

 


Neigh, C.S.R., Tucker, C.J., Townshend, J.R.G., and Collatz, G.J. (2006). North American Regional Vegetation Disturbances Observed with Multi-temporal Multi-spectral Satellite Data: 1975 – 2005. Poster presented at the University of Maryland PROMISE Research Symposium, University of Maryland, College Park, Maryland.

2006

 


Neigh, C.S.R., Tucker, C.J., Collatz, G.J., and Townshend, J.R.G. (2006). Identifying and Understanding Carbon Cycle Implications of North American Natural and Anthropogenic Disturbances: 1982 – 2005, Progress Report. Poster presented at NASA’s Land Cover Land Use Change Science Team Meeting, University of Maryland University College, College Park, Maryland.

2006

 


Neigh, C.S.R., Tucker, C.J., Townshend, J.R,G., and Collatz, G.J., (2006). North American Regional Ecosystem Dynamics Observed with Satellite Data. Poster presented at NASA’s Joint workshop on Biodiversity, Terrestrial Ecology, and Related Applied Sciences, University of Maryland University College, College Park, Maryland.

2006

 


Neigh, C.S.R., Tucker, C.J., and Collatz, G.J. (2005). Understanding and Identifying Carbon Cycle Implications of North American Natural and Anthropogenic Disturbances 1982 – 2005. Poster presented at NASA’s Land Cover Land Use Change Science Team Meeting, University of Maryland University College, College Park, Maryland.

2005

 


Neigh, C.S.R., Tucker, C.J., and Townshend, J.R.G. (2005). Regional North American Land Cover Disturbances Observed Over the Past 30 Years. Poster presented at the University of Maryland Bioscience Research and Technology Review Day, University of Maryland, College Park, Maryland.

2005

 


Neigh, C.S.R., Tucker, C.J., Collatz, G.J., and Townshend, J.R.G. (2005). Regional North American AVHRR NDVI Disturbances Classified in Landsat: 1982 – 2003. Poster presented at the American Geophysical Union (AGU) Fall meeting, San Francisco, California.

2005

 


Publications


Refereed

2024. "Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Tier 1 forest biomass estimates from Earth Observation." Scientific Data 11 (1): 1127 [10.1038/s41597-024-03930-9] [Journal Article/Letter]

2024. "Surface Reflectance From Commercial Very High Resolution Multispectral Imagery Estimated Empirically With Synthetic Landsat (2023)." IEEE Journal of Selected Topics in Applied Earth Observations and Remote Sensing 1-10 [10.1109/jstars.2024.3456587] [Journal Article/Letter]

2024. "Leveraging the next generation of spaceborne Earth observations for fuel monitoring and wildland fire management." Remote Sensing in Ecology and Conservation [10.1002/rse2.416] [Journal Article/Letter]

2024. "Spaceborne Lidar and Stereogrammetry Data Fusion to Predict Aboveground Biomass in Tropical Forests." IGARSS 2024 - 2024 IEEE International Geoscience and Remote Sensing Symposium 3592-3595 [10.1109/igarss53475.2024.10641914] [Proceedings]

2024. "Vegetation Height Stereo Reconstruction With BlackSky Commercial Frame Camera Imagery." IGARSS 2024 - 2024 IEEE International Geoscience and Remote Sensing Symposium 116 2446-2450 [10.1109/igarss53475.2024.10642757] [Proceedings]

2024. "EO-Validation: Low Latency Commodity-Based Collaborative Validation Framework for Geoai Data Products." IGARSS 2024 - 2024 IEEE International Geoscience and Remote Sensing Symposium 51 6916-6919 [10.1109/igarss53475.2024.10641506] [Proceedings]

2024. "A Deep Learning Data Fusion Approach for Modeling Land use in Smallholder Agriculture Systems." IGARSS 2024 - 2024 IEEE International Geoscience and Remote Sensing Symposium 4077-4080 [10.1109/igarss53475.2024.10641952] [Proceedings]

2024. "A Pilot Study of 10-Day Composites From the NASA Harmonized Landsat and Sentinel-2 Images for Terrestrial Monitoring." IGARSS 2024 - 2024 IEEE International Geoscience and Remote Sensing Symposium 6864-6866 [10.1109/igarss53475.2024.10641064] [Proceedings]

2024. "A shift in transitional forests of the North American boreal will persist through 2100." Communications Earth & Environment 5 (1): 290 [10.1038/s43247-024-01454-z] [Journal Article/Letter]

2024. "Estimating forest height and above-ground biomass in tropical forests using P-band TomoSAR and GEDI observations." International Journal of Remote Sensing 45 (9): 3129-3148 [10.1080/01431161.2024.2343134] [Journal Article/Letter]

2024. "Calibration of Maxar Constellation over Libya-4 Site using MAIAC Technique." IEEE Journal of Selected Topics in Applied Earth Observations and Remote Sensing 17 5460-5469 [10.1109/jstars.2024.3367250] [Journal Article/Letter]

2024. "Need and vision for global medium-resolution Landsat and Sentinel-2 data products." Remote Sensing of Environment 300 113918 [10.1016/j.rse.2023.113918] [Journal Article/Letter]

2023. "Modeling forest canopy surface retrievals using very high-resolution spaceborne stereogrammetry: (II) optimizing acquisition configurations." Remote Sensing of Environment 298 113824 [10.1016/j.rse.2023.113824] [Journal Article/Letter]

2023. "Modeling forest canopy surface retrievals using very high-resolution spaceborne stereogrammetry: (I) methods and comparisons with actual data." Remote Sensing of Environment 298 113825 [10.1016/j.rse.2023.113825] [Journal Article/Letter]

2023. "The 50-year Landsat collection 2 archive." Science of Remote Sensing 8 100103 [10.1016/j.srs.2023.100103] [Journal Article/Letter]

2023. "Training Strategies of CNN for Land Cover Mapping with High Resolution Multi-Spectral Imagery in Senegal." IGARSS 2023 - 2023 IEEE International Geoscience and Remote Sensing Symposium [10.1109/igarss52108.2023.10283308] [Proceedings]

2023. "Large-Scale Distributed Compositing and Statistics Framework For Very-High-Resolution Remote Sensing Imagery." IGARSS 2023 - 2023 IEEE International Geoscience and Remote Sensing Symposium [10.1109/igarss52108.2023.10283222] [Proceedings]

2023. "Producing a Science-Ready Commercial Data Archive: A Workflow for Estimating Surface Reflectance for High Resolution Multispectral Imagery." IGARSS 2023 - 2023 IEEE International Geoscience and Remote Sensing Symposium [10.1109/igarss52108.2023.10281820] [Proceedings]

2023. "Integrating Spaceborne Lidar Nasa’s Gedi With Imaging Sensors To Map Aboveground Biomass In Fragmented Tropical Forests." IGARSS 2023 - 2023 IEEE International Geoscience and Remote Sensing Symposium [10.1109/igarss52108.2023.10282548] [Proceedings]

2023. "Land Cover Mapping in the Amhara Region of Northwest Ethiopia Using Convolutional Neural Networks and Domain Adaptation Techniques." IGARSS 2023 - 2023 IEEE International Geoscience and Remote Sensing Symposium [10.1109/igarss52108.2023.10283273] [Proceedings]

2023. "Patterns of regional site index across a North American boreal forest gradient." Environmental Research Letters [10.1088/1748-9326/acdcab] [Journal Article/Letter]

2023. "Two decades of land cover change and forest fragmentation in Liberia: Consequences for the contribution of nature to people." Conservation Science and Practice [10.1111/csp2.12933] [Journal Article/Letter]

2023. "Optimizing WorldView-2, -3 cloud masking using machine learning approaches." Remote Sensing of Environment 284 113332 [10.1016/j.rse.2022.113332] [Journal Article/Letter]

2022. "Estimating crop type and yield of small holder fields in Burkina Faso using multi-day Sentinel-2." Remote Sensing Applications: Society and Environment 27 100820 [10.1016/j.rsase.2022.100820] [Journal Article/Letter]

2022. "Desert Locust Cropland Damage Differentiated from Drought, with Multi-Source Remote Sensing in Ethiopia." Remote Sensing 14 (7): 1723 [10.3390/rs14071723] [Journal Article/Letter]

2022. "Using DESIS and EO-1 HYPERION Reflectance Time Series for the Assessment of Vegetation Traits and Gross Primary Production (GPP)." The International Archives of the Photogrammetry, Remote Sensing and Spatial Information Sciences XLVI-1/W1-2021 1-8 [10.5194/isprs-archives-xlvi-1-w1-2021-1-2022] [Journal Article/Letter]

2022. "Boreal forests." Balancing Greenhouse Gas Budgets 203-236 [10.1016/b978-0-12-814952-2.00025-3] [Article in Book]

2021. "Mapping global forest age from forest inventories, biomass and climate data." Earth System Science Data 13 (10): 4881-4896 [10.5194/essd-13-4881-2021] [Journal Article/Letter]

2021. "Estimating Bare Earth in Sparse Boreal Forests With WorldView Stereo Imagery." IEEE Geoscience and Remote Sensing Letters 1-5 [10.1109/lgrs.2021.3112387] [Journal Article/Letter]

2021. "Storm surge and ponding explain mangrove dieback in southwest Florida following Hurricane Irma." Nature Communications 12 (1): 4003 [10.1038/s41467-021-24253-y] [Journal Article/Letter]

2020. "Fusion Approach for Remotely-Sensed Mapping of Agriculture (FARMA): A Scalable Open Source Method for Land Cover Monitoring Using Data Fusion." Remote Sensing 12 (20): 3459 [10.3390/rs12203459] [Journal Article/Letter]

2020. "The bioclimatic extent and pattern of the cold edge of the boreal forest: the circumpolar taiga-tundra ecotone." Environmental Research Letters [10.1088/1748-9326/abb2c7] [Journal Article/Letter]

2020. "A multi-modal approach for monitoring changes in agriculture in the Mekong River delta." Proceedings of IEEE IGARSS 2020 [10.1109/IGARSS39084.2020.9324083] [Proceedings]

2020. "Space‐Based Observations for Understanding Changes in the Arctic‐Boreal Zone." Reviews of Geophysics 58 (1): 2019RG000652 [10.1029/2019rg000652] [Journal Article/Letter]

2020. "Cloud-computing and machine learning in support of country-level land cover and ecosystem extent mapping in Liberia and Gabon." PLOS ONE 15 (1): e0227438 [10.1371/journal.pone.0227438] [Journal Article/Letter]

2020. "Modelling above-ground biomass stock over Norway using national forest inventory data with ArcticDEM and Sentinel-2 data." Remote Sensing of Environment 236 111501 [10.1016/j.rse.2019.111501] [Journal Article/Letter]

2019. "An API for Spaceborne Sub-Meter Resolution Products for Earth Science." IGARSS 2019 - 2019 IEEE International Geoscience and Remote Sensing Symposium [10.1109/igarss.2019.8898358] [Proceedings]

2019. "Boreal canopy surfaces from spaceborne stereogrammetry." Remote Sensing of Environment 225 148-159 [10.1016/j.rse.2019.02.012] [Journal Article/Letter]

2019. "Exploiting the convergence of evidence in satellite data for advanced weather index insurance design." Weather, Climate, and Society 11 (1): 65–93 [10.1175/wcas-d-17-0111.1] [Journal Article/Letter]

2018. "Smallholder crop area mapped with wall-to-wall WorldView sub-meter panchromatic image texture: A test case for Tigray, Ethiopia." Remote Sensing of Environment 212 8-20 [10.1016/j.rse.2018.04.025] [Journal Article/Letter]

2018. "Missing pieces to modeling the Arctic-Boreal puzzle." Environmental Research Letters 13 (2): [10.1088/1748-9326/aa9d9a] [Journal Article/Letter]

2017. "Hyperion: The first global orbital spectrometer, earth observing-1 (EO-1) satellite (2000–2017)." 2017 IEEE International Geoscience and Remote Sensing Symposium (IGARSS) [10.1109/igarss.2017.8127639] [Proceedings]

2017. "Extracting smallholder cropped area in Tigray, Ethiopia with wall-to-wall sub-meter WorldView and moderate resolution Landsat 8 imagery." Remote Sensing of Environment 202 142-151 [10.1016/j.rse.2017.06.040] [Journal Article/Letter]

2017. "EO-1 Data Quality and Sensor Stability with Changing Orbital Precession at the End of a 16 Year Mission." Remote Sensing 9 (5): 412 [10.3390/rs9050412] [Journal Article/Letter]

2017. "The use of sun elevation angle for stereogrammetric boreal forest height in open canopies." Remote Sensing of Environment 196 76-88 [10.1016/j.rse.2017.04.024] [Journal Article/Letter]

2016. "Monitoring Orbital Precession of EO-1 Hyperion With Three Atmospheric Correction Models in the Libya-4 PICS." IEEE Geoscience and Remote Sensing Letters 13 (12): 1797-1801 [10.1109/lgrs.2016.2612539] [Journal Article/Letter]

2016. "Calibration and Validation of Landsat Tree Cover in the Taiga−Tundra Ecotone." Remote Sensing 8 (7): 551 [10.3390/rs8070551] [Journal Article/Letter]

2016. "Regional rates of young US forest growth estimated from annual Landsat disturbance history and IKONOS stereo imagery." Remote Sensing of Environment 173 282–293 [10.1016/j.rse.2015.09.007] [Journal Article/Letter]

2015. "Quantifying Libya-4 surface reflectance heterogeneity with WorldView-1, 2 and EO-1 Hyperion." IEEE Geoscience and Remote Sensing Letters 12 (11): 2277 - 2281 [10.1109/LGRS.2015.2468174] [Journal Article/Letter]

2014. "Evaluating an Automated Approach for Monitoring Forest Disturbances in the Pacific Northwest from Logging, Fire and Insect Outbreaks with Landsat Time Series Data." Forests 5 (12): 3169-3198 [10.3390/f5123169] [Journal Article/Letter]

2014. "An Automated Approach to Map the History of Forest Disturbance from Insect Mortality and Harvest with Landsat Time-Series Data." Remote Sensing 6 (4): 2782-2808 [10.3390/rs6042782] [Journal Article/Letter]

2014. "Deciphering the Precision of Stereo IKONOS Canopy Height Models for US Forests with G-LiHT Airborne LiDAR." Remote Sensing 6 (3): 1762-1782 [10.3390/rs6031762] [Journal Article/Letter]

2013. "Taking stock of circumboreal forest carbon with ground measurements, airborne and spaceborne LiDAR." Remote Sensing of Environment 137 274-287 [10.1016/j.rse.2013.06.019] [Journal Article/Letter]

2013. "Trend Change Detection in NDVI Time Series: Effects of Inter-Annual Variability and Methodology." Remote Sensing 5 (5): 2113-2144 [10.3390/rs5052113] [Journal Article/Letter]

2013. "High-Resolution Satellite Data Open for Government Research." Eos, Transactions American Geophysical Union 94 (13): 121-123 [10.1002/2013EO130002] [Journal Article/Letter]

2010. "Deciphering the components of regional net ecosystem fluxes following a bottom-up approach for the Iberian Peninsula." Biogeosciences 7 (11): 3707-3729 [10.5194/bg-7-3707-2010] [Journal Article/Letter]

2008. "North American vegetation dynamics observed with multi-resolution satellite data." Remote Sens Environ 112 1749-1772 [Journal Article/Letter]

2007. "Synchronous NDVI and surface air temperature trends in Newfoundland: 1982 to 2003." Intl J Remote Sensing 28 (11): 2581-2598 [Journal Article/Letter]

Non-Refereed

2024. "The Arctic." Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society 105 (8): S277-S330 [https://doi.org/10.1175/BAMS-D-21-0086.1] [Journal Article/Letter]

2023. "Summary of the Final Activities of the 2018-2023 Landsat Science Team." The Earth Observer 35 (5): 38-42 [Newsletter]

2015. "LiDAR-based Biomass Estimates, Boreal Forest Biome, Eurasia, 2005-2006." Oak Ridge, Tennessee, USA: Oak Ridge National Laboratory Distributed Active Archive Center [10.3334/ORNLDAAC/1278] [Dataset]

2009. "Determining Carbon Consequences of Vegetation Change Dynamics in North America with Long-Term Multi-Resolution Data." Earth Observer 21 (1): 28-34 [Newsletter]