Project Title: Airborne Digital Elevation Models (DEM)
Project Description:
Airborne Digital Elevation Models (DEM) from a new NASA/JPL sensor
have systematic errors, mostly due to platform motions, that must be
characterized and removed before data are made widely available. The
student will work with a group of scientists and engineers to find
ground control points (GCP) from topographic maps that can be used to
correct the DEMs using existing software. Errors will be compiled in
order to improve future data collection. Data collected by the Shuttle
Radar Laboratory in 1994 may also be run through this process. Some
field work is possible for collection of GCP.
Background Information:
DEMs of the earth's surface are used by a wide variety of earth
scientists. Studies include measurements of the shapes of various
landforms such as valleys, alluvial fans, and volcanoes and modeling
of land-surface processes such as water flow, erosion, and atmospheric
interactions with the land. Recently, a new technique, radar
interferometry, has made the acquisition of DEMs easier. An airborne
testbed, TOPSAR, has been flying for 3 years, collecting data for a
number of investigators all over the world. Eventually, this will lead
to a spaceborne capability. As mentioned above, the platform
introduces systematic errors in TOPSAR DEMs. In order to make TOPSAR
data more useful to the community, we remove these errors by finding a
few GCP and running software to correct the DEMs. They are then posted
to an anonymous ftp site for transfer to the scientists.
Literature References:
Evans, D.L., T.G. Farr, H.A. Zebker, J.J. van Zyl, P.J. Mouginis-Mark,
1992, Radar interferometry studies of the Earth's topography, Eos Trans.
American Geohpys. Union, v. 73, p. 553-558.
Farr, T.G., D.L. Evans, H.A. Zebker, D. Harding, J. Bufton, T. Dixon, S.
Vetrella, D. Gesch, 1995, TOPSAT: The Global Topography Mission, Parts 1
and 2, in press, Eos Trans. American Geohpys. Union.
Zebker, H.A., S.N. Madsen, J. Martin, K.B. Wheeler, T. Miller, Y. Lou, G.
Alberti, S. Vetrella, A. Cucci, 1992, The TOPSAR interferometric radar
topographic mapping instrument, IEEE Trans. Geosci. Rem. Sens., v. 30, p.
933-940.
Requirements:
The sponsor requires that interested students meet the following
requirements:
Require: familiarity with computers and maps.
Desire: interest in earth science, familiarity with topographic maps and
measurements made on them, ability to make careful measurements.
This opportunity is for:
Caltech students. Will consider non-Caltech students
Research Sponsor
Sponsor: Tom Farr
Division: JPL
Mail Code: 300-233
Phone: 354-9057
E-mail: tom.farr@jpl.nasa.gov