Session programme

The Open Session on Geosciences Instrumentation is the European forum with an open call for professional conference papers in the field of Geosciences Instrumentation, Methods, Software and Data Systems. The session aims to inform the scientific and engineering geosciences communities about new and/or improved instrumentation and methods, and their related new or existing applications. The session also deals with new ways of utilizing observational data by novel approaches and the required data infrastructure design and organization.

The session is open to all branches of geosciences measurement techniques, including, but not limited to, optical, electromagnetic, seismic, acoustic and gravity. The session is intended as an open forum and discussion between representatives of different fields within geosciences is strongly encouraged. Past experience has shown that such mutual exchange and cross fertilization between fields have been very successful and can open up for a break-through in frontier problems of modern geosciences.

The session is also open for applications related to environmental monitoring and security providing, like archeological surveys, rubbish deposits studies, unexploded ordnance and/or mines detection, water dam inspection, seismic hazards monitoring etc.

Environmental systems often span spatial and temporal scales covering different orders of magnitude. The session is oriented in collecting studies relevant to understand multiscale aspects of these systems and in proposing adequate multi-platform and inter-disciplinary surveillance networks monitoring tools systems. It is especially aimed to emphasize the interaction between environmental processes occurring at different scales. In particular, a special attention is devoted to the studies focused on the development of new techniques and integrated instrumentation for multiscale monitoring high natural risk areas, such as: volcanic, seismic, energy exploitation, slope instability, floods, coastal instability, climate changes and other environmental context.
We expect contributions derived from several disciplines, such as applied geophysics, geology, seismology, geodesy, geochemistry, remote and proximal sensing, volcanology, geotechnical, soil science, marine geology, oceanography, climatology and meteorology. In this context, the contributions in analytical and numerical modeling of geological and environmental processes are also expected.
Finally, we stress that the inter-disciplinary studies that highlight the multiscale properties of natural processes analyzed and monitored by using several methodologies are welcome.

Recent advances in image collection, e.g. using uncrewed aerial vehicles (UAVs), and topographic measurements, e.g. using terrestrial or airborne LiDAR, are providing an unprecedented insight into landscape and process characterization in geosciences. In parallel, historical data including terrestrial, aerial, and satellite photos as well as historical digital elevation models (DEMs), can extend high-resolution time series and offer exciting potential to distinguish anthropogenic from natural causes of environmental change and to reconstruct the long-term evolution of the surface from local to landscape scale.

For both historic and contemporary scenarios, the rise of techniques with ‘structure from motion’ (SfM) processing has democratized data access and offers a new measurement paradigm to geoscientists. Photogrammetric and remote sensing data are now available on spatial scales from millimetres to kilometres and over durations of single events to lasting time series (e.g. from sub-second to decadal-duration time-lapse), allowing the evaluation of event magnitude and frequency interrelationships.

The session welcomes contributions from a broad range of geoscience disciplines such as geomorphology, cryosphere, volcanology, hydrology, bio-geosciences, and geology, addressing methodological and applied studies. Our goal is to create a diversified and interdisciplinary session to explore the potential, limitations, and challenges of topographic datasets for the reconstruction and interpretation of past and present 2D and 3D changes in different environments and processes. We further encourage contributions describing workflows that optimize data acquisition and processing to guarantee acceptable accuracies and to automate data application (e.g. geomorphic feature detection and tracking), and field-based experimental studies using novel multi-instrument and multi-scale methodologies. This session invites contributions on the state of the art and the latest developments in i) modern photogrammetric and topographic measurements, ii) remote sensing techniques as well as applications, iii) modelling technologies, and iv) data processing tools, for instance, using machine learning approaches.

Non-destructive testing (NDT) methods have been increasingly employed in a wide range of engineering and geosciences applications and their stand-alone use has been greatly investigated to date. New theoretical developments, technological advances as well as the progress achieved in surveying, data processing and interpretation have in fact led to a tremendous growth of the equipment reliability, allowing outstanding data quality and accuracy.

Nevertheless, the requirements of comprehensive site and material investigations may be complex and time-consuming, involving multiple expertise and different equipment. The challenge is to step forward and provide an effective integration between data outputs with different physical quantities, scale domains and resolutions. In this regard, enormous development opportunities relating to data fusion, integration and correlation between different NDT methods and theories are to be further investigated.

Within this framework, this Session primarily aims at disseminating contributions from state-of-the-art NDT methods and numerical developments, promoting the integration of existing equipment and the development of new algorithms, surveying techniques, methods and prototypes for effective monitoring and diagnostics. NDT techniques of interest are related – but not limited to – the application of acoustic emission (AE) testing, electromagnetic testing (ET), ground penetrating radar (GPR), geoelectric methods (GM), laser testing methods (LM), magnetic flux leakage (MFL), microwave testing, magnetic particle testing (MT), neutron radiographic testing (NR), radiographic testing (RT), thermal/infrared testing (IRT), ultrasonic testing (UT), seismic methods (SM), vibration analysis (VA), visual and optical testing (VT/OT).

The Session will focus on the application of different NDT methods and theories and will be related – but not limited to – the following investigation areas:
- advanced data fusion;
- advanced interpretation methods;
- design and development of new surveying equipment and prototypes;
- assessment and monitoring methods for material and site investigations;
- comprehensive and inclusive information data systems for the investigation of survey sites and materials;
- numerical simulation and modelling of data outputs with different physical quantities, scale domains and resolutions;
- advances in NDT methods, numerical developments and applications (stand-alone use of existing and state-of-the-art NDTs).

The session gathers geoscientific aspects such as dynamics, reactions, and environmental/health consequences of radioactive materials that are massively released accidentally (e.g., Chernobyl and Fukushima nuclear power plant accidents, wide fires, etc.) and by other human activities (e.g., nuclear tests).

The radioactive materials are known as polluting materials that are hazardous for human society, but are also ideal markers in understanding dynamics and physical/chemical/biological reactions chains in the environment. Thus, the radioactive contamination problem is multi-disciplinary. In fact, this topic involves regional and global transport and local reactions of radioactive materials through atmosphere, soil and water system, ocean, and organic and ecosystem, and its relation with human and non-human biota. The topic also involves hazard prediction and nowcast technology.

By combining 35 years (> halftime of Cesium 137) monitoring data after the Chernobyl Accident in 1986, 10 years dense measurement data by the most advanced instrumentation after the Fukushima Accident in 2011, and other events, we can improve our knowledgebase on the environmental behavior of radioactive materials and its environmental/biological impact. This should lead to improved monitoring systems in the future including emergency response systems, acute sampling/measurement methodology, and remediation schemes for any future nuclear accidents.

The following specific topics have traditionally been discussed:
(a) Atmospheric Science (emissions, transport, deposition, pollution);
(b) Hydrology (transport in surface and ground water system, soil-water interactions);
(c) Oceanology (transport, bio-system interaction);
(d) Soil System (transport, chemical interaction, transfer to organic system);
(e) Forestry;
(f) Natural Hazards (warning systems, health risk assessments, geophysical variability);
(g) Measurement Techniques (instrumentation, multipoint data measurements);
(h) Ecosystems (migration/decay of radionuclides).

The session consists of updated observations, new theoretical developments including simulations, and improved methods or tools which could improve observation and prediction capabilities during eventual future nuclear emergencies. New evaluations of existing tools, past nuclear contamination events and other data sets also welcome.

Source of most progress in artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) can be traced back to data. Data, specifically, large-scale and openly-accessible training data are critical in adoption and acceleration of ML. While there are successful applications of ML in Earth science, the wider adoption of ML has been limited. Access to high-quality labeled training data is required to entice ML practitioners to tackle supervised learning problems in Earth science. However, creating labeled data that scales to support ML models is still a bottleneck and new strategies to increase the size and diversity of training datasets need to be explored. Additionally, enabling discovery and open sharing of existing training data and corresponding models to enable reproducibility of research and minimize duplication is a challenge.

This session seeks submissions from ML practitioners and data curators using different approaches to create labeled training data, catalog training data and models, and provide search, discovery and distribution of training data and models.

Geostatistical methods are commonly applied in the Water, Earth and Environmental sciences to quantify spatial variation, produce interpolated maps with quantified uncertainty and optimize spatial sampling designs. Space-time geostatistics explores the dynamic aspects of environmental processes and characterise the dynamic variation in terms of correlations. Geostatistics can also be combined with machine learning and mechanistic models to improve the modelling of real-world processes and patterns. Such methods are used to model soil properties, produce climate model outputs, simulate hydrological processes, and to better understand and predict uncertainties overall. Big data analysis and data fusion have become major topics of research due to technological advances and the abundance of new data sources from remote and proximal sensing as well as a multitude of environmental sensor networks. Methodological advances, such as hierarchical Bayesian modeling, machine learning, sparse Gaussian processes, local interaction models, as well as advances in geostatistical software modules in R and Python have enhanced the geostatistical toolbox.

This session aims to provide a forum where scientists from different disciplines can present and discuss innovative geostatistical methods targeting important problems in the Water, Earth and Environmental sciences. We also encourage contributions focusing on real-world applications of state-of-the-art geostatistical methods.

The topics of interest include:
1) Space-time geostatistics for hydrology, soil, climate system observations and modelling
2) Hybrid methods: Integration of geostatistics with optimization and machine learning approaches
3) Advanced parametric and non-parametric spatial estimation and prediction techniques
4) Big spatial data: analysis and visualization
5) Optimisation of spatial sampling frameworks and space-time monitoring designs
6) Algorithms and applications on Earth Observation Systems
7) Data Fusion, mining and information analysis
8) Geostatistical characterization of uncertainties and error propagation
9) Bayesian geostatistical analysis and hierarchical modelling
10) Functional data analysis approaches to geostatistics
11) Multiple point geostatistics

This session is co-sponsored by the International Association for Mathematical Geosciences (IAMG), https://www.iamg.org/

This interdisciplinary session welcomes contributions on novel conceptual and/or methodological approaches and methods for the analysis and statistical-dynamical modeling of observational as well as model time series from all geoscientific disciplines.
Methods to be discussed include, but are not limited to linear and nonlinear methods of time series analysis. time-frequency methods, statistical inference for nonlinear time series, including empirical inference of causal linkages from multivariate data, nonlinear statistical decomposition and related techniques for multivariate and spatio-temporal data, nonlinear correlation analysis and synchronisation, surrogate data techniques, filtering approaches and nonlinear methods of noise reduction, artificial intelligence and machine learning based analysis and prediction for univariate and multivariate time series.
Contributions on methodological developments and applications to problems across all geoscientific disciplines are equally encouraged. We particularly aim at fostering a transfer of new methodological data analysis and modeling concepts among different fields of the geosciences.

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Sub-Session "Mathematical Climatology and Space-time Data Analysis" (Abdel Hannachi, Amro Elfeki, Christian Franzke, Muhammad Latif, Carlos Pires)

The recent progress in mathematical methods to solve various problems in weather & climate nonlinear dynamics and data analysis calls for the need to develop a new session that focus on those methods. Novel and powerful mathematical methods have been developed and used in different subjects of climate. Because those methods are used within specific contexts they go unnoticed most of the time by climate researchers. The proposed new session will provide the opportunity to climate scientists and researchers working on developing mathematical methods for climate to come together and present their findings in a transparent way. This will also be easily accessible to other climate scientists who look for, and are interested in specific methods to solve their problems.
Contributions are encouraged from researchers working on mathematical methods and their application to weather and climate. We particularly welcome contributions on optimization, dimension reduction and data mining, space-time patterns identification, machine learning, statistical prediction modelling, nonlinear methods , Bayesian statistics, and Monte-Carlo Markov Chain (MCMC) methods in stochastic modelling.

Earth science research has become increasingly collaborative through shared code and shared platforms. Researchers work together on data, software and algorithms to answer cutting-edge research questions. Teams also share these data and software with other collaborators to refine and improve these products. As data volumes continue to grow, researchers will need new platforms to both enable analysis at scale and to support the sharing of data and software.

Software is critical to the success of science. Creating and using Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) fosters contributions from the scientific community, creates a peer-reviewed and consensus-oriented environment, and promotes the sustainability of science infrastructures.

This session will look at how Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) and cloud-based architecture solutions support information sharing, scientific collaboration, scientific reproducibility and solutions that enable large-scale data analytics.

Earth Sciences depend on detailed multi-variate measurements and investigations to understand the physical, geological, chemical, biogeochemical and biological processes of the Earth. Making accurate prognoses and providing solutions for current questions related to climate change, water, energy and food security are important requests towards the Earth Science community worldwide. In addition to these society-driven questions, Earth Sciences are still strongly driven by the eagerness of individuals to understand processes, interrelations and tele-connections within and between small sub-systems and the Earth System as a whole. Understand and predict temporal and spatial changes in the above mentioned Micro- to Earth spanning scales is the key to understand Earth ecosystems; we need to utilize high resolution data across all scales in an integrative/holistic approach. Using Big Data, which are often distributed and particularly very in-homogenous, has become standard practice in Earth Sciences and digitalization in conjunction with Data Science promises new discoveries.
The understanding of the Earth System as a whole and its sub-systems depends on our ability to integrate data from different disciplines, between earth compartments, and across interfaces. The need to advance Data Science capabilities and to enable earth scientists to follow best possible workflows, apply methods, and use computerized tools properly and in an accessible way has been identified worldwide as an important next step for advancing scientific understanding. This is particularly necessary to access knowledge contained in already acquired data, but which due to the limitations of data integration and joint exploration possibilities currently remains invisible. This session aims to bring together researchers from Data and Earth Sciences working on, but not limited to,
• SMART monitoring designs by dealing with advancing monitoring strategies to e.g. detect observational gaps and refine sensor layouts to allow better and statistically robust extrapolation
• Data management and stewardship solutions compliant with FAIR principles, including the development and application of real-time capable data management and processing chains
• Data exploration frameworks providing qualified data from different sources and tailoring available computational and visual methods to explore and analyse multi-parameter data generated through monitoring efforts/ model simulations

Most of the processes studied by geoscientists are characterized by variations in both space and time. These spatio-temporal phenomena have been traditionally investigated using linear statistical approaches, as in the case of physically-based models and geostatistical models. Additionally, the rising attention toward machine learning, as well as the rapid growth of computational resources, opens new horizons in understanding, modeling, and forecasting complex spatio-temporal systems through the use of stochastics non-linear models.

These issues are particularly relevant in the field of performance evaluations of Earth Systems Science Prediction (ESSP) systems. A central issue in this domain deals with the representativeness of observational data used for evaluation, which are often not representative of the physical structures that are being predicted. While many large spatial and temporal observations datasets can help provide this information, adequate tools to integrate these large datasets to provide meaningful physical insights on the strengths and weaknesses of predicted fields are required. Other challenges deal with the large storage volumes to handle model simulations, large spatio-temporal datasets, and verification statistics which are difficult to maintain.

This session aims at exploring the new challenges and opportunities opened by the spread of data-driven statistical learning approaches in Earth and Soil Sciences. We invite cutting-edge contributions related to methods of spatio-temporal geostatistics or data mining on topics that include, but are not limited to:
- meaningful and informative model evaluation frameworks and platforms for ESSP;
- advances in spatio-temporal modeling using geostatistics and machine learning;
- uncertainty quantification and representation;
- innovative techniques of knowledge extraction based on clustering, pattern recognition and, more generally, data mining.

The main applications will be closely related to the research in Earth system science and quantitative geography. A non-complete list of possible applications includes:
- weather and climate (e.g. numerical weather prediction, hydrologic prediction, climate prediction and projection);
- natural and anthropogenic hazards (e.g. floods; landslides; earthquakes; wildfires; air pollution);
- interaction between geosphere and anthroposphere (e.g. land degradation; urban sprawl);
- socio-economic sciences (e.g. census data; transport; commuter traffic).

This is a merged session of “Spatio-temporal data science: theoretical advances and applications in computational geosciences” and “Innovative Evaluation Frameworks and Platforms for Weather and Climate Research”.

Significant investments are made globally in laboratory analytical research in the Earth and space sciences to extract new scientific insights from Earth and planetary materials. Expensive laboratory infrastructure and advanced instrumentation generates data at an ever increasing level of precision, resolution, and volume. Any data generated at any scale needs to be efficiently managed and losslessly transferred from instruments in “Private” domains to a “Collaboration” domains, where researchers can analyze and share these data as well as the analytical tools. Ultimately, the data need to be transferred to the “Public” domain, complete with all relevant information about the analytical process and uncertainty, and cross-references to originating samples and publications. Many solutions today are bespoke and inefficient, lacking, for example, unique identification of samples, instruments, and data sets needed to trace the analytical history of the data.

This session seeks contributions about new developments to achieve FAIR, scalable and sustainable access to analytical data from any laboratory instrument and domain at any scale (from an individual instrument in a geochemical lab to data measured with synchrotrons), and any stage from the initial collection of the sample through to the publication of the final data, including the use of persistent identifiers to uniquely identify samples, instruments, researchers, grants, data, etc. Papers are welcome on systems that transfer data/metadata directly from instruments to “collaborative storage areas” that facilitate sharing and processing of geochemical data, as well as systems that transfer data used in publications to relevant repositories that ensure long term persistence of data and enhanced reproducibility of geochemical research.

This session aims to inform the geoscientists and engineers regarding new and/or improved instrumentation and methods for space and planetary exploration, as well as about their novel or established applications.
The session is open to all branches of planetary and space measurement tools and techniques, including, but not limited to: optical, electromagnetic, seismic, acoustic, particles, and gravity.
Please, kindly take contact with the conveners if you have a topic that may be suitable for a review talk.
This session is also intended as an open forum, where discussion between representatives of different fields within planetary, space and geosciences will be strongly encouraged, looking for a fruitful mutual exchange and cross fertilization between scientific areas.

Various space agencies around the world, the scientific community, and industrial partners are currently making advancements with a number of anticipated missions to the Moon, Mars, and other Solar System bodies. Each mission has a unique set of goals that calls for strategically selected instruments accommodating a diverse set of platforms, such as but not limited to, rovers, orbiters, and human explorers. This session invites presentations on a broad topic of future planetary missions and instruments, including those already in development. Our aim is to share latest progress, discuss preflight scientific results, and increase awareness for potential cooperation.

Cartography and mapping are at this time the only means to conduct basic geoscientific studies (on planetary surfaces). The field of Planetary Cartography and Mapping has been stepping out of its niche existence in the last 15 years due to the availability of an unprecedented amount of new data from various planetary exploration missions from different countries and the advent of internet technology that allows to manage, process, distribute, analyze, and collaborate efficiently. Geospatial information system technology plays a pivotal role in this process and essentially all planetary surface science research in this field benefits from this technology and frequent new developments.
With the availability of data and connection, however, comes the challenge of organizing and structuring available data and research, such as maps and newly derived and refined (base) data that is about to enter its new research life cycle.
This session welcomes presentations covering planetary data and its development into cartographic products and maps. This covers aspects of data archival, dissemination, structuring, analyzing, filtering, visualizing, collaboration, and map compilation but is not limited to these topics.
It should also be emphasized that the exchange of knowledge and experiences from the Earth Sciences would be highly beneficial for the Planetary Data Sciences.

Space-based measurements of the Earth System, including its atmosphere, oceans, land surface, cryosphere, biosphere, and interior, require extensive prelaunch and post launch calibration and validation activities to ensure scientific accuracy and fitness for purpose throughout the 
lifetime of satellite missions. This requirement stems from the need to demonstrate unambiguously that the space-based measurements, typically based on engineering measurements by the detectors (e.g. photons), are sensitive to and can be used to retrieve reliably the geophysical and/or biogeochemical parameters of interest at locations across the Earth.
Most geophysical parameters vary in time and space, and the retrieval algorithms used must be accurate under the full range of conditions. Calibration and validation over the lifetime of missions assure that any long-term variation in observation can be unambiguously tied to the evolution of the Earth system. Such activities are also critical in ensuring that measurements from different satellites can be inter-compared and used seamlessly to create long-term multi-instrument/multi-platform data sets, which serve as the basis for large-scale international science investigations into topics with high societal or environmental importance. Examples of such investigations include the ice mass balance of Greenland, monitoring the evolution of sea ice and snow cover in the Arctic, assessing sinks and sources of methane in the Arctic and improving our knowledge of the terrestrial carbon cycle through multi-sensor forest biomass mapping. This session seeks presentations on the use of surface-based, airborne, and/or space-based observations to prepare and calibrate/validate space-based satellite missions measuring our Earth system. A particular but not exclusive focus will be on activities carried out jointly by NASA and ESA as part of their Joint Program Planning Group Subgroup on calibration and validation and field activities.

Understanding Earth’s system natural processes, especially in the context of global climate change, has been recognised globally as a very urgent and central research direction which need further exploration. With the launch of new satellite platforms with a high revisit time, combined with the increasing capability for collecting repetitive ultra-high aerial images, through unmade aerial vehicles, the scientific community have new opportunities for developing and applying new image processing algorithms to solve old and new environmental issues.

The purpose of the proposed session is to gather scientific researchers related to this topic aiming to highlight ongoing researches and new applications in the field of satellite and aerial time-series imagery. The session focus is on presenting studies aimed at the development or exploitation of novel satellite times series processing algorithms, and applications to different types of remote sensing data for investigating longtime processes in all branches of Earth (sea, ice, land, atmosphere).

The conveners encourage both applied and theoretical research contributions focusing in novel methods and applications of satellite and aerial time-series imagery all disciplines of geosciences, including both aerial and satellite platforms and data acquired in all regions of the electromagnetic spectrum.

In 2020, the Japanese Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) and the European Space Agency (ESA) signed an agreement on the “Cooperation for the Use of Synthetic Aperture Radar Satellites in Earth Science and Applications”. The cooperation focuses on the joint analysis of L-band data acquired by JAXA’s ALOS-2/PALSAR-2 satellite together with ESA’s Sentinel-1 C-band satellite data for various applications. Research areas include polar and ocean monitoring, snow water equivalent retrieval, forest and wetland monitoring, surface soil moisture and agriculture monitoring, as well as the monitoring of geohazards and urban areas.

The key objective of the JAXA-ESA cooperation is to develop a better understanding of the benefits of combining L-band and C-band data over various areas and for the different thematic applications. A comparison with ground-based campaign data is envisaged to validate the results. The research projects will provide important insights for the development of future (L-band) SAR satellite missions, such as JAXA’s ALOS-4 satellite and the High Priority Candidate Mission (HPCM) ROSE-L currently in development at ESA, as well as synergies with existing and future spaceborne C-band SAR missions including Sentinel-1 and Sentinel-1 Next Generation.

This jointly chaired session shall give the involved scientists the opportunity to present ongoing research and results and foster the collaboration and exchange between European, Japanese and international participants.

Organizers: Julia Kubanek (ESA), Shin-ichi Sobue (JAXA), Malcolm Davidson (ESA), Takeo Tadono (JAXA), Maurice Borgeaud (ESA)

Cosmic rays carry information about space and solar activity, and, once near the Earth, they produce isotopes, influence genetic information, and are extraordinarily sensitive to water. Given the vast spectrum of interactions of cosmic rays with matter in different parts of the Earth and other planets, cosmic-ray research ranges from studies of the solar system to the history of the Earth, and from health and security issues to hydrology and climate change.
Although research on cosmic-ray particles is connected to a variety of disciplines and applications, they all share similar questions and problems regarding the physics of detection, modeling, and the influence of environmental factors.

The session brings together scientists from all fields of research that are related to monitoring and modeling of cosmogenic radiation. It will allow sharing of expertise amongst international researchers as well as showcase recent advancements in their field. The session aims to stimulate discussions about how individual disciplines can share their knowledge and benefit from each other.

We solicit contributions related but not limited to:
- Health, security, and radiation protection: cosmic-ray dosimetry on Earth and its dependence on environmental and atmospheric factors
- Planetary space science: satellite and ground-based neutron and gamma-ray sensors to detect water and soil constituents
- Neutron monitor research: detection of high-energy cosmic-ray variations and its dependence on local, atmospheric, and magnetospheric factors
- Hydrology and climate change: low-energy neutron sensing to measure water in reservoirs at and near the land surface, such as soils, snow pack, and vegetation
- Cosmogenic nuclides: as tracers of atmospheric circulation and mixing; as a tool in archaeology or glaciology for dating of ice and measuring ablation rates; and as a tool for surface exposure dating and measuring rates of surficial geological processes
- Detector design: technological advancements for the detection of cosmic rays
- Cosmic-ray modeling: advances in modeling of the cosmic-ray propagation through the magnetosphere and atmosphere, and their response to the Earth's surface
- Impact modeling: How can cosmic-ray monitoring support environmental models, weather and climate forecasting, irrigation management, and the assessment of natural hazards

This session invites contributions on the latest developments and results in lidar remote sensing of the atmosphere, covering • new lidar techniques as well as applications of lidar data for model verification and assimilation, • ground-based, airborne, and space-borne lidar systems, • unique research systems as well as networks of instruments, • lidar observations of aerosols and clouds, thermodynamic parameters and wind, and trace-gases. Atmospheric lidar technologies have shown significant progress in recent years. While, some years ago, there were only a few research systems, mostly quite complex and difficult to operate on a longer-term basis because a team of experts was continuously required for their operation, advancements in laser transmitter and receiver technologies have resulted in much more rugged systems nowadays, many of which are already operated routinely in networks and some even being automated and commercially available. Consequently, also more and more data sets with very high resolution in range and time are becoming available for atmospheric science, which makes it attractive to consider lidar data not only for case studies but also for extended model comparison statistics and data assimilation. Here, ceilometers provide not only information on the cloud bottom height but also profiles of aerosol and cloud backscatter signals. Scanning Doppler lidars extend the data to horizontal and vertical wind profiles. Raman lidars and high-spectral resolution lidars provide more details than ceilometers and measure particle extinction and backscatter coefficients at multiple wavelengths. Other Raman lidars measure water vapor mixing ratio and temperature profiles. Differential absorption lidars give profiles of absolute humidity or other trace gases (like ozone, NOx, SO2, CO2, methane etc.). Depolarization lidars provide information on the shapes of aerosol and cloud particles. In addition to instruments on the ground, lidars are operated from airborne platforms in different altitudes. Even the first space-borne missions are now in orbit while more are currently in preparation. All these aspects of lidar remote sensing in the atmosphere will be part of this session.

Global plastic production has increased exponentially since the fifties, with 359 million metric tons manufactured in 2018 alone. Nearly 20% of this production took place within Europe, where at least half of discarded plastics collected for ‘recycling’ were instead exported to China and SE Asia. Every year, an increasing proportion of these plastics (in the order of millions of tons) enter and accumulate in our waterways and oceans. In riverine and marine systems, the presence of micro to macroplastic debris has generated a growing and persistent threat to the environment and ecosystems, as well as an urgent and multi-dimensional challenge for our society.

Methods for resource-efficient and large-scale detection and monitoring of plastic litter are still relatively new. However, in the last few years, they have blossomed across technologies and environments - from mounted cameras to drones to satellites, and from lakes and rivers to coastal waters and open oceans. These new technologies can be crucial to fill in the gaps between limited in situ observations and global models, allowing coverage across fine as well as large spatial scales, and over long time periods. We invite abstracts describing the use of cameras, drones, satellites and other remote sensing techniques to observe and monitor riverine and marine plastics. We also welcome work describing or demonstrating new approaches, methods and algorithms to improve the use of cameras and sensors for plastic detection on (and in) water.

This session is linked to the Pan-Eurasian EXperiment (PEEX; www.atm.helsinki.fi/peex), a multi-disciplinary, -scale and -component climate change, air quality, environment and research infrastructure and capacity building programme. It is aimed at resolving major uncertainties in Earth system science and global sustainability issues concerning the Arctic, Northern Eurasia and China regions. This session aims to bring together researchers interested in (i) understanding environmental changes effecting in pristine and industrialized Pan-Eurasian environments (system understanding); (ii) determining relevant environmental, climatic, and other processes in Arctic-boreal regions (process understanding); (iii) the further development of the long-term, continuous and comprehensive ground-based, air/seaborne research infrastructures together with satellite data (observation component); (iv) to develop new datasets and archives of the continuous, comprehensive data flows in a joint manner (data component); (v) to implement validated and harmonized data products in models of appropriate spatio-temporal scales and topical focus (modeling component); (vi) to evaluate impact on society though assessment, scenarios, services, innovations and new technologies (society component).
List of topics:
• Ground-based and satellite observations and datasets for atmospheric composition in Northern Eurasia and China
• Impacts on environment, ecosystems, human health due to atmospheric transport, dispersion, deposition and chemical transformations of air pollutants in Arctic-boreal regions
• New approaches and methods on measurements and modelling in Arctic conditions;
• Improvements in natural and anthropogenic emission inventories for Arctic-boreal regions
• Physical, chemical and biological processes in a northern context
• Aerosol formation-growth, aerosol-cloud-climate interactions, radiative forcing, feedbacks in Arctic, Siberia, China;
• Short lived pollutants and climate forcers, permafrost, forest fires effects
• Carbon dioxide and methane, ecosystem carbon cycle
• Socio-economical changes in Northern Eurasia and China regions.
PEEX session is co-organized with the Digital Belt and Road Program (DBAR), abstracts welcome on topics:
• Big Earth Data approaches on facilitating synergy between DBAR activities & PEEX multi-disciplinary regime
• Understanding and remote connection of last decades changes of environment over High Asia and Arctic regions, both land and ocean.

Water is our planet’s most vital resource, and the primary agent in some of the biggest hazards facing society and nature. The twin pressures of population growth and a rapidly changing global climate act as multipliers of water’s value and of water-related hazards.

River streamflow is one of the most crucial hydrological variables for ecology, for people and industry, for flood risk management and for understanding long term changes to the hydrological regime. However, despite significant efforts, long-term, spatially dense monitoring networks remain scarce, and even the best monitoring networks can fail to perform when faced with extreme conditions, and lack the precision and spatial coverage to fully represent crucial aspects of the hydrological cycle.

Happily, a number of new technologies and techniques are emerging which show great potential to meet these challenges. In this context, this session focuses on:
1) Innovative methodologies for measuring/modelling/estimating river stream flows;
2) Real-time acquisition of hydrological variables;
3) Remote sensing for hydrological & morphological monitoring;
4) Measuring extreme conditions associated with a changing climate;
5) Measurement of sudden-onset extreme flows associated with catastrophic events;
6) Strategies to quantify and describe hydro-morphological evolution of rivers;
7) New methods to cope with data-scarce environments;
8) Inter-comparison of innovative & classical models and approaches;
9) Evolution and refinement of existing methods;
10) Guidelines and standards for hydro-morphological streamflow monitoring;
11) Quantification of uncertainties;
12) Development of expert networks to advance methods.

Contributions are welcome with an emphasis on innovation, efficiency, operator safety, and meeting the growing challenges associated with the changing climate, and with natural and anthropogenically driven disasters such as dam failures and flash floods.

Additionally, presentations will be welcomed which explore options for greater collaboration in advancing riverflow methods and which link innovative research to operational monitoring.

This session is sponsored by the COST Action CA16219, Harmonisation of UAS techniques for agricultural and natural ecosystems monitoring (HARMONIOUS).

Evapotranspiration (ET), the key component of water and energy balances, has myriad challenges to measure it precisely. In the last two decades, innovative approaches for remote sensing (RS) based measurements of ET has allowed for its measurement in a range of climates on most continents for different green covers. Remotely-sensed ET methods have been proved to be reliable, affordable and applicable to a broad range of scales from plot/field to regional to global in different landscapes including agricultural, forested, riparian zones and urban green spaces.

We invite researchers to contribute abstracts to share their advances and challenges in the development, application, validation, calibration and accuracy assessment of landscape ET through remote sensing platforms. We welcome studies that estimate ET using both prognostic and diagnostic approaches from process-based models that rely on the integration of gridded precipitation and soil-vegetation dynamics to a more direct estimation of ET using remote sensing-based data streams. The scope of the session will include: (1) advances in remote sensing-based ET estimation, (2) applications for a range of land covers and spatiotemporal scales, and (3) accuracy enhancement.

Geophysical and in-situ measurements of the cryosphere offer important baseline datasets, as well as validation for modelling and remote sensing products. In this session we welcome contributions related to a wide spectrum of methods, including, but not limited to radioglaciology, active and passive seismology, acoustic sounding, Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) reflectometry or time delay techniques, cosmic ray neutron sensing, remotely operated vehicle (ROV) or drone applications, geoelectrics, nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) and methods in radiative transfer (i.e. infrared photography, thermal sounding...).

Contributions could be related to field applications, new approaches in geophysical or in-situ survey techniques, or theoretical advances in data analysis processing or inversion. Case studies from all parts of the cryosphere such as snow and firn, alpine glaciers, ice sheets, glacial and periglacial environments, permafrost, or sea ice, are highly welcome. The focus of the session is to compare experiences in the application, processing, analysis and interpretation of different geophysical and in-situ techniques in these highly complex environments.

This year our session will be a virtual PICO session. The session begins with each presenter giving a “quick fire” 2-minute overview of their research, followed by breakout "rooms" - one per presentation, for authors to further discuss their research. We hope the virtual PICO format will provide as much lively discussion as our normal in-person PICO!

++++++++++++++++++++ Invited Speaker ++++++++++++++++++++

Amy R. Macfarlane: Quasi in-situ snow and sea ice interface microstructure measured by micro-computed tomography

What possibilities the underground facilities, laboratories, research & educational mines, and test-sites bring to the researchers, businesses, and other stakeholders? You are welcomed to showcase your research conducted and to present the multidisciplinary ways how the underground laboratories and test-sites are used for science, engineering, and even for business.

We welcome all the underground laboratory and geological test-sites to showcase their facilities and services, highlighting the importance of geoscientific site understanding as a research and innovation driver.

An uncrewed aerial vehicle (UAV), commonly known as a drone, is an aircraft without a human pilot aboard. Originating mostly from military applications, their use is rapidly expanding to commercial, recreational, agricultural, and scientific applications. Unlike crewed aircraft, UAVs were initially used for missions too "dull, dirty, or dangerous" for humans. Nowadays however, many modern scientific experiments have begun to use UAVs as a tool to collect different types of data. Their flexibility and relatively simple usability now allow scientist to accomplish tasks that previously required expensive equipment like piloted aircrafts, gas, or hot air balloons. Even the industry has begun to adapt and offer extensive options in UAV characteristics and capabilities. At this session, we would like people to share their experience in using UAVs for scientific research. We are interested to hear about specific scientific tasks accomplished or attempted, types of UAVs used, and instruments deployed.

Instrumentation and measurement technologies are currently playing a key role in the monitoring, assessment and protection of water resources.
This session focuses on measurement techniques, sensing methods and data science implications for the observation of water systems, given the strong link between measurement aspects and computational aspects, especially in the water sector.
This session aims at providing an updated framework of the observational techniques, data processing approaches and sensing technologies for water management and protection, giving also attention to today’s data science aspects, e.g. data analytics, big data, cloud computing and Artificial Intelligence.
We welcome contributions about field measurement approaches, development of new sensing techniques, low cost sensor systems and measurement methods enabling crowdsourced data collection also through social sensing. Therefore, water quantity and quality measurements as well as water characterization techniques are within the scope of this session.
Remote sensing techniques for the monitoring of water resources and/or the related infrastructures are also welcome.
Contributions dealing with the integration of data from multiple sources are solicited, as well as the design of ICT architectures (including IoT concepts) and of computing systems for the user-friendly monitoring of the water resource and the related networks.
Studies about signal and data processing techniques (including AI approaches) and the integration between sensor networks and large data systems are also very encouraged.

This session covers both new scientific approaches and state-of-the-art techniques for investigating landslides, including Earth Observation (EO), Geophysical Surveying (GS) and close-range Remote Sensing techniques (RS).

A series of remarkable technological progresses are driven new scientific opportunities to better understand landslide dynamics worldwide, including integrated information about rheological properties, water content, rate of deformation and time-varying changes of these parameters through seasonal changes and/or progressive slope damage.

This session welcomes innovative contributions and lessons learned from significant case studies and/or original methods aiming to increase our capability to detect, model and predict landslide processes at different scales, from site specific to regional studies, and over multiple dimensions (e.g. 2D, 3D and 4D).

A special emphasis is expected not only on the particularities of data collection from different platforms (e.g. satellite, aerial, UAV, Ground Based...) and locations (e.g. surface- and borehole-based geophysics) but also on new solutions for digesting and interpreting datasets of high spatiotemporal resolution, landslide characterization, monitoring, modelling, as well as their integration on real-time EWS, rapid mapping and other prevention and protection initiatives. Examples of previous submissions include using one or more of the following techniques: optical and radar sensors, new satellite constellations (including the emergence of the Sentinel-1A and 1B), Remotely Piloted Aircraft Systems (RPAS) / Unpiloted Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) / drones, high spatial resolution airborne LiDAR missions, terrestrial LIDAR, Structure-from-Motion (SfM) photogrammetry, time-lapse cameras, multi-temporal DInSAR, GPS surveying, Seismic Reflection, Surface Waves Analysis, Geophysical Tomography (seismic and electrical), Seismic Ambient Vibrations, Acoustic Emissions, Electro-Magnetic surveys, low-cost sensors, commercial use of small satellites, Multi-Spectral images, etc. Other pioneering applications using big data treatment techniques, data-driven approaches and/or open code initiatives for investigating mass movements using the above-described techniques will also be very welcomed.

GUEST SPEAKER (to be confirmed). Previous guest speakers include prof. J. Chambers (British Geological Survey - UK) and prof. D. Jongmans (Isterre, Université Grenoble Alpes - France).

New developments in translation, rotation and strain sensing (such as fibre-optic gyroscopes and fiber-optic cables) enable the complete observation of seismic ground motion and deformation. Applications are manifold, ranging from the reduction of non-uniqueness in seismic inverse problems over the correction of tilt effects to the characterization, separation and reconstruction of the seismic wavefield.

Instrumental developments in ground-motion sensing overlap with considerable improvements in optical and atom interferometry for inertial rotation and gravity sensing which has led to a variety of improved sensor concepts over the last two decades.

We invite all contributions on theoretical advances to the seismic wavefield gradient analysis, on novel measurement techniques, and on all aspects of applications in seismology, geodesy, planetary exploration, gravitational wave detection and fundamental physics.

Tectonically and volcanically active areas are subject to faulting, fracturing, volcanic eruptions, caldera or flank collapse, and magmatic intrusions, such as dyking. These events trigger typical geomorphological features and geomorphological changes that researchers can study in the field and remotely. Satellite data using optical or thermal sensors, and ship acoustics datasets, provide first order information about faulting and volcanic activity, however, there is a resolution gap below the meter-scale, critical to detect and to analyse small structures over broad areas and to better assess how faults, magma intrusions and collapses nucleate and evolve. Moreover, during large metrical ground deformations (earthquakes, dyke intrusions, collapses), the near-field area where satellite radar signal (InSAR) becomes incoherent remains poorly studied, likewise happens in deep sea environments using vessel-based acoustics techniques. In addition, classical field surveys and data collection are, very often, not feasible due to difficult logistic conditions and/or inaccessible areas. Therefore, there is a need to collect higher resolution data to better understand geomorphologic, faulting and volcanic processes at scales from cm to a few meters, that complement classical field studies and remote sensing data.
Structure-from-Motion (SfM) photogrammetry techniques have been applied using imagery acquired from field, aerial and underwater survey, using Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs, i.e. drones), Remotely Operated Vehicles (ROVs), Autonomous Underwater Vehicles (AUVs), balloons, airplanes and helicopters, as well as cameras and mobile phones. This technique produces digital surface models (DSM), ortho-mosaic imagery, dense point clouds and 3-D models, creating a high-resolution environment reconstruction for local outcrops or broader areas.
The session will focus on the application of SfM for research in the field of structural geology, active tectonics, volcano-tectonics, and geomorphology, with particular regard to tectonically and volcanically active areas. The session covers the following topics: i) case studies where the SfM has been employed; ii) SfM methods, 3-D reconstruction and post-processing analysis; iii) integration and comparison of SfM-derived, field and broad-scale data (such as satellites and acoustics techniques); iv) new tools and methods for data analysis on SfM-derived models; and vi) future works and applications of SfM techniques.

Seismic techniques are becoming widely used to detect and quantitatively characterise a wide variety of natural processes occurring at the Earth’s surface. These processes include mass movements such as landslides, rock falls, debris flows and lahars; glacial phenomena such as icequakes, glacier calving/serac falls, glacier melt and supra- to sub-glacial hydrology; snow avalanches; water storage and water dynamics phenomena such as water table changes, river flow turbulence and fluvial sediment transport. Where other methods often provide limited spatial and temporal coverage, seismic observations allow recovering sequences of events with high temporal resolution and over large areas. These observational capabilities allow establishing connections with meteorological drivers, and give unprecedented insights on the underlying physics of the various Earth’s surface processes as well as on their interactions (chains of events). These capabilities are also of first interest for real time hazards monitoring and early warning purposes. In particular, seismic monitoring techniques can provide relevant information on the dynamics of flows and unstable slopes, and thus allow for the identification of precursory patterns of hazardous events and timely warning.

This session aims at bringing together scientists who use seismic methods to study Earth surface dynamics. We invite contributions from the field of geomorphology, cryospheric sciences, seismology, natural hazards, volcanology, soil system sciences and hydrology. Theoretical, field based and experimental approaches are highly welcome.

Solicited presenter: Kate Allstadt - USGS Geologic Hazards Science Center, Golden, CO, USA

Remote sensing measurements, acquired using different platforms - ground, UAV, aircraft and satellite - have increasingly become rapidly developing technologies to study and monitor Earth surface, to perform comprehensive analysis and modeling, with the final goal of supporting decision systems for ecosystem management. The spectral, spatial and temporal resolutions of remote sensors have been continuously improving, making environmental remote sensing more accurate and comprehensive than ever before. Such progress enables understanding multiscale aspects of high-risk natural phenomena and development of multi-platform and inter-disciplinary surveillance monitoring tools. The session welcomes contributions focusing on present and future perspectives in environmental remote sensing, from multispectral/hyperspectral optical and thermal sensors. Applications are encouraged to cover, but not limited to, the monitoring and characterization of environmental changes and natural hazards from volcanic and seismic processes, landslides, and soil science. Specifically, we are looking for novel solutions and approaches including the topics as follows: (i) state-of-the-art techniques focusing on novel quantitative methods; (ii) new applications for state-of-the-art sensors, including UAVs and other close-range systems; (iii) techniques for multiplatform data fusion.

Natural radioactivity is ubiquitous in the environment as a result of i) cosmic radiation from space and secondary radiation from the interaction of cosmic rays with the atmosphere, ii) terrestrial sources from soils and rocks and particularly Potassium (K-40), Uranium (U-238) and Thorium (Th-232) and their decay products among which Radon gas (Rn-222) stands out. An additional contribution to the environmental radioactivity comes from the fallout of artificial radionuclides (e.g. Cs-137, Cs-134) from nuclear and radiation accidents and incidents.
Nuclear techniques enable the measurement of radioactivity in air, soils and water even at trace levels, making it a particularly appealing tool for tracing time-varying environmental phenomena. This session welcomes contributions addressing the measurement and exploitation of environmental radioactivity in all areas of geosciences, including, but not limited to:

- volcanic monitoring and surveillance;
- identification of faults and tectonic structures;
- mineral exploration;
- coastal and marine monitoring;
- soil erosion processes;
- Naturally Occurring Radioactive Materials (NORMs) and Taylor-made building materials;
- geostatistical methods for radioactivity mapping;
- atmospheric tracing, mixing and transport processes;
- Radon Eurocode and indoor air quality monitoring
- cosmic rays;
-fingerprinting approaches of natural waters (e.g. groundwater resources for mineral and drinking water)
- public health linked to the EU BSS and Euratom directives.

Contributions on novel methods and instrumentation for environmental radioactivity monitoring are particularly encouraged, including payloads for airborne measurements, drones and small satellites.

Observations from aircraft, remotely piloted aircraft systems (RPAS/UAV/UAS) and balloons are an important means to obtain a broad view of processes within the Earth environment during measurement campaigns. The range of available instruments enables a broad and flexible range of applications. It includes sensors for meteorological parameters, trace gases and cloud/aerosol particles and more complex systems like high spectral resolution lidar, hyperspectral imaging at wavelengths from the visible to thermal infra-red and synthetic aperture radar. The use of small state-of-the-art instruments, the combination of more and more complex sets of instruments with improved accuracy and data acquisition speed enables more complex campaign strategies even on small aircraft, balloons or RPASs.
Applications include atmospheric parameters, surface properties of vegetation, glaciological processes, sea ice and iceberg studies, soil and minerals and dissolved or suspended matter in inland water and the ocean. Ground based systems and satellites are key information sources to complement airborne datasets and a comprehensive view of the observed system is often obtained by combining all three. Aircraft and balloon operations depend on weather conditions either to obtain the atmospheric phenomenon of interest or the required surface-viewing conditions and so require detailed planning. They cover large areas in the horizontal and vertical with adaptable temporal sampling. Future satellite instruments can be tested using airborne platforms during their development. The validation of operational satellite systems and applications using airborne measurements has come increasingly into focus with the European Copernicus program in recent years.
This session will bring together aircraft, balloon and RPAS operators and the research community to present:
• an overview of the current status of environmental research with a focus on the use of airborne platforms
• recent observation campaigns and their outcomes
• multi-aircraft/balloon/RPAS and multi-RI campaigns
• using airborne and ground-based RI to complement satellite data, including cal/val campaigns
• identifying and closing capability gaps
• contributions of airborne measurements to modelling activities
• airborne platforms to reduce the environmental footprint of alternative observation strategies
• airborne instruments, developments and observations
• future plans involving airborne observational research

Geomorphometry and geomorphological mapping are important tools used for understanding landscape processes and dynamics on Earth and other planetary bodies. The recent rapid advances in technology and data collection methods has made available vast quantities of geospatial data for such morphometric analysis and mapping, with the geospatial data offering unprecedented spatio-temporal range, density, and resolution, but it also created new challenges in terms of data processing and analysis.

This inter-disciplinary session on geomorphometry and landform mapping aims to bridge the gap between process-focused research fields and the technical domain where geospatial products and analytical methods are developed. The increasing availability of a wide range of geospatial datasets requires the continued development of new tools and analytical approaches as well as landform/landscape classifications. However, a potential lack of communication across disciplines results in efforts to be mainly focused on problems within individual fields. We aim to foster collaboration and the sharing of ideas across subject-boundaries, between technique developers and users, enabling us as a community to fully exploit the wealth of geospatial data that is now available.

We welcome perspectives on geomorphometry and landform mapping from ANY discipline (e.g. geomorphology, planetary science, natural hazard assessment, computer science, remote sensing). This session aims to showcase both technical and applied studies, and we welcome contributions that present (a) new techniques for collecting or deriving geospatial data products, (b) novel tools for analysing geospatial data and extracting innovative geomorphometric variables, (c) mapping and/or morphometric analysis of specific landforms as well as whole landscapes, and (d) mapping and/or morphometric analysis of newly available geospatial datasets. Contributions that demonstrate multi-method or inter-disciplinary approaches are particularly encouraged. We also actively encourage contributors to present tools/methods that are “in development”.

Soil conservation is a necessary action to achieve a sustainable world because of the crucial role that soils play in the earth system. Reproducible and precise methods are vital to obtain credible data in the soil studies. This session will provide the premier forum for the presentation of new advances in the fields of experimental, theoretical, and applied soil conservation and eco sustainability. The topics of interest for submission may focus on the new technologies regarding soil conservation and eco sustainability together with the important results related to the novel approaches. In details, we seek abstracts on the following topics: erosional and depositional processes, watershed management, soil evolution and weathering, soils and surface processes, land degradation and restoration, environmental sustainability, resource management, sustainable cities, hazardous substances and detection techniques. The promoted methodologies include remote sensing, lab experiments, field experiments, environmental regulation and monitoring, economic technology and instruments, and modeling and decision support tools.