Following the success of the previous four international biennial conferences (2006-2012) on Drylands, Deserts, and Desertification (DDD), the organization of the 2014 DDD conference is now in full gear and the conference is scheduled to take place at the Jacob Blaustein Institutes for Desert Research, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Sede Boqer Campus, between November 17-20, 2014.

Andrew J. Hansen, Nathan Piekielek, Cory Davis, Jessica Haas, David M. Theobald, John E. Gross, William B. Monahan, Tom Olliff, and Steven W. Running 2014. Exposure of U.S. National Parks to land use and climate change 1900–2100. Ecological Applications 24:484–502. http://dx.doi.org/10.1890/13-0905.1

The webinar explored NASA's Land-Cover/Land-Use Change Program. The presentation included an overview of the program, followed by case studies highlighting urban, forest and agricultural land-use change tracking over time in the United States. Garik Gutman NASA Headquarters, Washington DC Cristina Milesi California State University Monterey Bay/NASA Ames Research Center Chengquan Huang University of Maryland David Roy South Dakota State University

Book chapter

Wetland areas in the Mid-Atlantic region are inundated or saturated for a relatively short period, usually in the spring after snowmelt and before leaf-out so monitoring the hydrologic condition of wetlands can be difficult. Remote sensing provides a major data source for monitoring wetland dynamics. The purpose of this study was to develop a new approach to map wetland inundation using combined data from LiDAR (Light Detection and Ranging) and Landsat time series data.

The USDA Forest Service in partnership with Clemson University will be hosting a webinar showcasing NASA’s Land-Use/Land-Cover Change Program (LCLUC) program, exploring how time-tracking of land use observations from space could be used from a planning perspective . The webinar will be hosted on Wednesday, March 12 from 2 – 3:30 pm Eastern. The focus of the webinar series (and title) is Planning for Growth and Open Space Conservation. The audience is a mix of planners and natural resources managers at all levels of government and in the private sector. Dr.

PARIS — The French government has agreed to open its Spot optical Earth observation data archive and distribute, free of charge to noncommercial users, Spot satellite data that are at least five years old. The Jan. 23 announcement by the French space agency, CNES, followed a French government commitment made Jan. 17 during a meeting in Geneva of the 80 governments that comprise the Group on Earth Observations (GEO).

The main objective of the Executive Summer School is to provide professionals with a broad training programme in order to bridge the common gap between scientific knowledge and professional expertise related to core environmental themes. The modules provide an intensive immersion in the latest political and scientific issues on the global environmental agenda. They link the scientific knowledge and practical negotiation techniques relevant to the development and implementation of both legal and voluntary international agreements.

On February 3, 2014, the entire Landsat 8 archive will be cleared from the online cache and reprocessed to take advantage of calibration improvements identified during its first year of operation. All Landsat 8 scenes will be removed from the online cache at this time and these data will be reprocessed starting with the most recent acquisitions and proceeding back to the beginning of the mission. Data will then become available for download. Scenes waiting to be reprocessed will also be available for on-demand product orders. Reprocessing is expected to take approximately 50 days.

What is the coldest place on Earth? It’s a high ridge in Antarctica on the East Antarctic Plateau where temperatures can dip below minus 133.6 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 92 degrees Celsius) on a clear winter night.