Degree of Master of

Remote sensing

Remote sensing is an extensive science, drawing from many areas for support and development. Satellite and digital imagery play an important role in remote sensing; providing information about the land studied (Lillesand and Keifer 1994).
The field of remote sensing has been defined many times (Campbell 2002). Davis explains that remote sensing is “the art or science of telling something about an object without touching it” (Davis 2001) . Lintz and Simonnet describe it in the same way pointing out that remote sensing is “an acquisition of physical data of an object without touch or contact” (Lintz and Simonett 1976). Barrett and Curtis consider remote sensing as “an observation of a target by a device separated from it by some distance” (Barrett and Curtis 1992).
Campbell give a very comprehensive and complete description, i.e. remote sensing is “the practice of deriving information about the earth’s land and water surface using images acquired from an overhead perspective, using electromagnetic radiation in one or more regions of the electromagnetic spectrum, reflected or emitted from the earth surface” (Campbell 2002).

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Sabins considers remote sensing as an interesting and exploratory science, because it provides images of areas “in a fast and cost-efficient manner, and attempts to demonstrate what is happening right now in a study area”. While airphotos and fieldwork remain critical as sources of information, the cost and time to carry out these methods sometimes could not be feasible for the research. Satellite and digital imagery acquired recently, provide more overall detail to assist the researcher in the classification process (Sabins 1994).
Nowadays, remote sensing is widely used as a tool for environmental science. It should be emphasized that the present thesis mainly is interested in consideration of remote sensing for the water research. For instance, Jensen mostly examines remote sensing in context of its application in hydrological research (Jensen 2007). Rango states that remote sensing data are being used operationally in precipitation estimates, soil moisture, measurements for irrigation
scheduling, snow water equivalent and snow cover extent assessments, seasonal and short term snowmelt runoff forecasts, and surface water inventories (Rango 1994). Miller studies Remote Sensing of coastal aquatic environments and examines its various technologies, techniques and applications (Miller, Del Castillo et al. 2005).
In order to illustrate the great importance of remote sensing method in water area let us list several water research projects by application of this method.
To start with, several projects directed to water management in terms of irrigation farming have been accomplished and published in the various scientific journals. Some of them are, as follows: “Combining remote sensing-simulation modeling and genetic algorithm optimization to explore water management options in irrigated agriculture” in Agricultural Water Management (Ines, Honda et al. 2006); “Using remote sensing data for water depletion assessment at administrative and irrigation-system levels: case study of the Ferghana Province of Uzbekistan” in Agricultural Water Management (Chemin, Platonov et al. 2004); and “Remote sensing for irrigation water management in the semi-arid Northeast of Brazil” in Agricultural Water Management (Folhes, Rennу et al. 2009).
In common with the projects above, some research in other water related areas by using remote sensing has been accomplished and also issued, i.e.:

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  “Review of remote sensing applications in hydrology and water resources management in India” in Advances in Space Research (Bhavsar 1984);
  
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  “Remote sensing application to the management of agricultural drainage water in severely arid region: A case study” in Remote Sensing of Environment (Abderrahman and Bader 1992);
  
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  “Sustainable fresh water resources management in northern Kuwait--A remote sensing view from Raudatain basin” in International Journal of Applied Earth Observation and Geoinformation (Ud Din, Al Dousari et al. 2007);
  
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  “A multi-scale remote sensing approach for monitoring northern peatland hydrology: Present possibilities and future challenges” in Journal of Environmental Management (Harris and Bryant 2009);
  
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  “The role of remote sensing in hydrological modelling of the Okavango Delta, Botswana” in Journal of Environmental Management (Milzow, Kgotlhang et al. 2009).
  

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Concluding, all examples provided above clearly demonstrate that remote sensing is a powerful method for the water research and it can be applied for wide-ranging aspects of water area.

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