Remote Sensing for Monitoring Land Systems

Course description

Monitoring and mapping vegetation and land cover is one of the key activities in Earth observation (EO). EO products are pivotal for many geographic and environmental studies. In this module, students learn concepts and techniques for analyzing and mapping land cover and its characteristics at various spatial scales and with different sensor systems. Data analysis is performed entirely in R and students learn to create customized R scripts along a series of processing tasks throughout the semester. The module is designed for BSc students who want to deepen and extend their remote sensing skills with regard to theory and applications, and also want to gain problem-oriented knowledge in R. Participants must have successfully completed Module B8 Introduction to Remote Sensing or have equivalent experience. The module is fully taught in English and includes reading original articles in English. Student presentations and written reports may be given in English or German. International students with relevant experience are welcome.

Pflugmacher, D. 2025: Remote Sensing for Monitoring Land Systems. Department of Geography. Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin. https://pages.cms.hu-berlin.de/EOL/geo_advrs

Lovelace, R., Nowosad, J., Münchow, J., 2025. Geocomputation with r, Second edition. ed. CRC Press, Taylor; Francis Group, CRC Press is an imprint of theTaylor; Francis Group, an informa Buisness, A Chapman & Hall Book, Boca Raton.

Wickham, H., 2019. Advanced r, Second edition. ed. CRC Press/Taylor & Francis Group, Boca Raton.

Wickham, H., Çetinkaya-Rundel, M., Grolemund, G., 2023. R for data science, 2nd ed. O’Reilly Media, Incorporated, Sebastopol.