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As part of its Earth Observation Envelope Programme, the European Space Agency (ESA) announces an opportunity for scientists from the Earth Observation communities in ESA Member States and Canada to make proposals for missions to be evaluated as a potential Earth Explorer Opportunity Mission.

These missions are intended to be used to conduct research in the field of Earth Observation and/or to demonstrate the potential of new innovative Earth Observation techniques of relevance to both the scientific and the applications communities.

The Earth Observation Envelope Programme is a rolling programme designed to underpin European efforts in Earth observation from space. The Earth Explorer element of the programme consists of a series of space missions addressing critical Earth science issues. In the past, six missions have been selected for implementation; namely, three Earth Explorer Core Missions, GOCE (Gravity and Ocean Circulation Explorer), ADM-Aeolus (Doppler Wind Lidar), EarthCARE (Clouds, Aerosols and Radiation Explorer); and three Earth Explorer Opportunity Missions, CryoSat (Polar Ice Monitoring), SMOS (Soil Moisture and Ocean Salinity) and Swarm (Earth’s Magnetic Field and Environment Explorer). In addition, as a result of the evaluation of responses to the call for Earth Explorer Core Mission ideas in 2005, and the recent down-selection in 2009, the following three Earth Explorer Core mission candidates are currently entering studies at Phase-A level: BIOMASS, CoReH2O and PREMIER.

The motivation behind this Call is the Agency’s wish to involve the scientific community as far as possible in determining the content of the Earth Observation Envelope Programme. The Agency wants to achieve a clear appreciation of the science community’s views on what missions will give the highest scientific return.

Taking into account the experience from previous calls and in line with the spirit of the programme, the Agency is soliciting mission proposals for implementation as the Earth Explorer-8 Opportunity mission with a ceiling industrial cost of 100 MEURO at 2009 economic conditions.

A response to the Call may be made by European or Canadian scientists or teams of scientists, where proposing teams also may include scientists from non-ESA Member States.

The results of the evaluation of proposals will be presented to the Programme Board for Earth Observation (PB-EO) in November 2010.

Overall schedule

Release of the Call for Proposals: 2 October 2009
Deadline for receipt of Letter of Intent: 1 December 2009
Deadline for receipt of full Proposals: 1 June 2010
Announcement of evaluation results: 25 November 2010

SOURCE

ESA

As reported by Euractiv, the European Environment Agency (EEA) wants the current climate change debate to focus on water efficiency at least as heavily as it does on energy efficiency and the energy performance of buildings.

GMES will contribute to water monitoring and management for example through the provision of data related to the amount of groung water, precipitation and surface water.

More information at EURACTIV

SOURCE GMES.INFO

After leaving Thales Alenia Space in the south of France on 15 September, ESA’s SMOS Earth Explorer has arrived safely at the Plesetsk Cosmodrome in northern Russia, where it will be prepared for launch on 2 November.

The Antonov aircraft carrying the Soil Moisture and Ocean Salinity (SMOS) satellite, along with seven containers of support equipment, arrived at Arkhangelsk early in the morning of 16 September. Once unloaded from the aircraft, the precious cargo was transported by truck to the train station and then loaded onto wagons for the 12-hour ride to the launch site.

The train arrived at the Plesetsk Cosmodrome yesterday morning and the containers have now all been placed in the integration facilities where they are being unpacked today. The long journey seems to have gone well, and the signs are that satellite and equipment have arrived in good shape.

The SMOS team will now spend the next six weeks testing the satellite and preparing for launch. SMOS will be encapsulated, along with ESA’s Proba-2 satellite, in the fairing of the Rockot launcher in preparation for liftoff at 02.50 CET on 2 November.

The_Proba-2_ team have already carried out their initial preparations and will return to Plesetsk later this month to resume the campaign.

The arrival of SMOS at the launch site marks a significant milestone for ESA’s next Earth Explorer mission. Also known as ESA’s Water Mission, it is the first satellite dedicated to providing global measurements of soil moisture and ocean salinity. By regularly and consistently mapping these two variables, the mission will improve our understanding of the water cycle.

ESA’s Project Manager for the SMOS mission, Achim Hahne, commented, “I am really excited that the end is getting close, and so is the team.”

SOURCE ESA

Following the launch and in-orbit testing of the most sophisticated gravity mission ever built, ESA’s GOCE satellite is now in ‘measurement mode’, mapping tiny variations in Earth’s gravity in unprecedented detail.

The ‘Gravity field and steady-state Ocean Circulation Explorer’ (GOCE) satellite was launched on 17 March from northern Russia. The data now being received will lead to a better understanding of Earth’s gravity, which is important for understanding how our planet works.

It is often assumed that gravity exerts an equal force everywhere on Earth. However, owing to factors such as the rotation of the planet, the effects of mountains and ocean trenches, and density variations in Earth’s interior, this fundamental force is not quite the same all over.

Over two six-month uninterrupted periods, GOCE will map these subtle variations with extreme detail and accuracy. This will result in a unique model of the ‘geoid’ – the surface of an ideal global ocean at rest.

A precise knowledge of the geoid is crucial for accurate measurement of ocean circulation and sea-level change, both of which are influenced by climate. The data from GOCE are also much-needed to understand the processes occurring inside Earth. In addition, by providing a global reference to compare heights anywhere in the world, the GOCE-derived geoid will be used for practical applications in areas such as surveying and levelling.

A little over six months after launch, GOCE is now delivering the first set of data that will build into the most detailed map of Earth’s gravity field ever realised. Before entering this mode, the satellite was tested thoroughly. It was then gently brought down from an altitude of around 280 km to its current orbit slightly below 255 km, which is extremely low for an Earth observation satellite.

During the three months after launch, the satellite was commissioned and calibrated, which is standard procedure to ensure that all systems are working as they should. This included testing GOCE’s cutting-edge electric ion engine that helps keep the satellite’s orbit ‘drag-free’, and its highly sensitive gradiometer instrument, which senses the gravitational tug of Earth.

Gravity is stronger closer to Earth, so GOCE was designed to orbit as low as possible while remaining stable as it flies through the fringes of our atmosphere. To help avoid drag and ensure that the gravity measurements are of true gravity, the satellite has to be kept stable in ‘free fall’. Any buffeting from residual air at this low altitude could potentially drown out the gravity data.

GOCE’s sleek aerodynamic design helps this unique satellite to cut though what remains of the atmosphere at this exceptionally low altitude. Moreover, the electric ion thruster at the back continuously generates tiny forces to compensate for any drag that GOCE experiences along its orbit.

Space gradiometry and the use of the sophisticated electric propulsion are both ‘firsts’ in satellite technology, so the commissioning and calibration were particularly important for the success of the mission. This phase was completed in the summer, ready for the tricky task of bringing GOCE down to its operational altitude, which took a couple of months.

“You wouldn’t want to place a satellite like GOCE at the measurement altitude from day one,” commented Michael Fehringer, ESA’s GOCE System Manager. “We needed time to check the satellite without running the risk of decaying below the point where the ion propulsion could not compensate for the air drag. Therefore, at launch we injected GOCE into an initial orbit about 25 km above the measurement altitude. After commissioning, we brought it to its current altitude of 255 km, which we reached on 13 September. The ion propulsion started immediately and now we are in drag-free mode, ready for operation.”

It turns out there is very little solar activity at the moment, which means a calmer environment for GOCE. So its current orbit of 255 km is a few kilometres lower than engineers had originally planned. This is good news – the gravity measurements being made at the moment will be even more accurate.

Now fully operational, with its solar panels bathed in sunlight, GOCE has truly embarked upon its mission: to sense Earth’s gravity as never before.

Rune Floberghagen, ESA’s GOCE Mission Manager, said that, “The completion of the commissioning and first in-flight calibration marks an important milestone for the mission. We are now entering science operations and are looking forward to receiving and processing excellent three-dimensional information on the structure of Earth’s gravity field.”

Source ESA

…will be held at EUSC, Torrejon air base – Madrid (Spain) on November 3-5, 2009.

Motivation

Today the analysis of a few, very high resolution, multi-spectral images can be complex and challenging. In addition, the emerging needs from major applications (e.g.: mapping, global monitoring, disaster management support, non proliferation, etc.) and large programmes / initiatives (e.g.: Kopernikus, GEO, GEOSS), and the continuous increase in archives’ size and EO sensors’ variety, require new methodologies and tools for information mining and management, supported by shared knowledge. The manual process performed by experts to mine information from images is currently too complex and expensive to be applied systematically on even a small subset of the acquired scenes. This limits the full exploitation of the petabytes of archived or new data. The issue might become even more challenging in future since more missions – including constellations – are being planned, with broader sensor variety, higher data rates and increasing complexity. As an example, ENVISAT alone accumulates 400 terabytes of data every year. The problem is common also to other domains, like medicine, multimedia, and to a broad spectrum of other sensors’ data.

Results from current R&D activity might ease the access to the imagery (today mostly retrieved using spatio-temporal and a few more attributes) also through their information content. The need to access information also in large volumes of image data has stimulated the research in the field of content-based image retrieval during last decade. Many new concepts have been developed and prototyped. However the dramatic increase in volume, details, diversity and complexity, and the user demand for simultaneous access to multi-domain data urgently require new approaches for image information mining, multi-domain information management, and knowledge management and sharing (in support of information mining and training).

This year’s conference continues to focus on automation in support of applications and services for geospatial intelligence, for which Image Information Mining is considered of very high interest and appropriate. This theme proves most successful when cross-cued from other intelligence disciplines, therefore the conference topics are broadened towards more generic Information Mining. In addition, because the future will be marked by an explosion of satellite imaging missions, the conference is expected to bring new stimulating ideas, concepts or methods also for the use of multi-temporal images.

The event is the sixth in the series jointly organised by ESA and EUSC, and by JRC since 2009 , (see ESA-EUSC 2008).

Objectives

Presentations should focus on theory and applications leading to improve automation in geospatial information extraction and understanding from optical and SAR EO images and heterogeneous sources:
-Automatic image pre-processing (geo-referencing, ortho-rectification, radiometric calibration, etc.)
-Automated feature and information extraction from optical and SAR EO images
-Multi-temporal analysis
-Challenges for metre resolution optical and SAR EO images
-Geospatial Intelligence: synergies across images, maps and geo information
-Models, semantics and spatial syntax for image understanding
-Information mining from heterogeneous sources
-Human-machine communication for spatio-temporal reasoning
-Knowledge discovery and sharing
-Scenarios and constraints in Environment, Security and Intelligence applications
-System architectures for geospatial information processing

The main target audience includes the European space agencies and organisations, aerospace industry and research centres, research and academic institutions, commercial companies, value adders or service providers involved in any of above areas.

The “Panel on mining multi-temporal / -modal EO images and geo-information” will include topics like (final list will be made available with the programme):
-Users view points
-Multi-temporal EO images
-Multi-modal radar
-Geo-referenced text mining

Organisation

Participation: Participation to the Conference and the Panel is free of charge up to available seats (about 100)

Conference Date: November 3 – 4, 2009

Panel Date: November 5, 2009

Place: EUSC Torrejon air base – Madrid (Spain)

Important Dates:
-Extensive abstract, with indication if it is for interactive presentation or poster session, via e-mail to mihai.datcu@dlr.de, copy Sergio.DElia@esa.int, (subject: IIM ESA-EUSC-JRC 2009) by mid June, 2009
-Notification or acceptance (and format for article submission) will be provided to authors by mid September, 2009
-A limited number of demonstrations can be accepted: demonstration description and resource requirements shall be provided by e-mail to (Lucio Colaiacomo) l.colaiacomo@eusc.europa.eu (subject IIM ESA-EUSC-JRC 2009) by end September, 2009
-Deadline for registration to the Conference is mid October, 2009

Conference Chairman
-M. Datcu, DLR

Organising Committee
-S. D’Elia, ESA
-L. Colaiacomo, EUSC
-I. Sarantzis, EUSC
-M. Lafitte, EUSC
-J. Ebeltjes, EUSC
-P. Soille, JRC
-C. Gomez, EARSC
-K. Seidel, ETHZ
-R. King, MSU

Scientific Committee
IIMCG members
J.C. Tilton, NASAUSA

Conference Contributions will be published by ESA as Workshop Proceedings

This SIXTH CONFERENCE on IMAGE INFORMATION MINING is sponsored by:
European Image Information Mining Coordination Group, founded by:

-ASI, Agenzia Spaziale Italiana – Italian Space Agency
-CNES, Centre National d’Etudes Spatiales – French Space Agency
-CNR, Consiglio Nazionale Delle Ricerche – Italian National Research Council
DLR, Deutsches Zentrum fur Luft und Raumfahrt – German Aerospace Center
-EC-IST, European Commission – Information Society Technology
-ESA-ESRIN, European Space Agency – European Space Research Institute
-ETHZ, Eidgenussische Technische Hochschule Zurich – Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Zurich
-EUSC, European Union Satellite Centre

And extended to:
-EARSC, European Association of Remote Sensing Companies
-INGV, Istituto Nazionale Geofisica e Vulcanologia
-JRC, Joint Research Centre
-MSU, Mississippi State University

SOURCE.

A new era in operational Earth Observation was started by the launch 29. July of Deimos-1 and UK-DMC2 from Baikonur aboard a Dniepr rocket. The new satellites provide a manyfold increase in the capacity of the Disaster Monitoring Constellation and are capable of commercial, high-volume, image deliveries that are unprecedented for this class of radiometric and spatial resolutions.


The calibration of Deimos-1 instrument and the fine-tuning of the platform are well underway and it is foreseen to enter full operational capability during October. The quality of the instrument, specially designed for this satellite generation, is very high. Its focus quality, radiometric quality, and general system stability surpasses expectations and ensures years of sustained operations with imagery that leaves far behind Landsat in the radiometric bands principally used for agriculture and environmental applications.

Deimos-1 is born with a decided commercial vocation, and the company has been preparing applications for years, which are now ready for delivery as soon as operational capability starts. The Northern download station in Svalbard, in cooperation with KSAT, is ready and represents a guarantee of delivery that minimises memory bottlenecks in case demand for imagery is high.

Sample imagery taken from Deimos-1 satellite can be browsed at our web site, click on Deimos-1 Images on the left panel

Announcement of Opportunity

Deimos Imaging has opened a call for ideas for researchers to perform studies using Deimos-1 Imagery. Details are also on the main web page. As a summary, this is a call for researchers to use imagery from Deimos-1 in a Category-1 scheme, free of charge, to create new applications or do research in fields that are opened by the new class of satellites and instruments.

Deimos Imaging web site
Launch video

New pages have been created on this website which describe in more details the GMES services currently developped in the field of marine monitoring, emergency response, atmosphere monitoring and security.

A page addressing the land domain will also be available soon.

In particular, the “marine” and “atmosphere” pages provide access to pre-operational GMES services:

  • The marine page gives access to the services developped by the MyOcean project. These services are made available to users through an interactive catalogue.
  • The atmosphere page gives access to a wide range of services developped through the PROMOTE, GEMS and from now MACC. These services address greenhouse gases monitoring, aerosols monitoring, UV monitoring, etc.

Source

A conference entitled ‘Earth observation and the water cycle: towards a water cycle multi-mission strategy’ will be held from 18 to 20 November in Frascati, Italy.

Recent advances in Earth observation (EO) satellites have made possible improved global observations of several key parameters governing the global water cycle. In the coming years, an increasing number of EO missions will be launched by space agencies, enhancing our capacity to observe the Earth’s surface. The full exploitation of this capacity by scientific and institutional users requires coordinated research efforts to develop robust global and regional operational products using observation and modelling systems and data assimilation capabilities.

The specific objectives of this topical conference are: – to assess recent progress and uncertainties in the full range of water cycle observations: precipitation, soil moisture, clouds, evapotranspiration, water vapour, surface water and groundwater measurements as well as surface heat fluxes and the Earth radiation budget; – to identify the main needs and uncertainties in modelling and data assimilation from global to basin scales to improve our knowledge of water cycle science and our ability to quantify future changes in water cycle variables; – to advocate the challenges and opportunities in water cycle science in order to reduce uncertainties in water-related climate change impacts and adaptation strategies in water resources; – to consolidate a scientific roadmap outlining the main priorities for the development of robust global and regional geo-information data products, improved models and effective data assimilation systems.

For further information, please visit

Category: Events
Data Source Provider: European Space Agency
Document Reference: Based on an event announcement
Subject Index: Climate change & Carbon cycle research; Innovation, Technology Transfer; Space & satellite research; Water resources and management
RCN: 31309

The European Commission has a set of measures to help finance innovative and growing small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs).

This includes making finance systems more SME friendly, facilitating finance of start-ups, innovation and growth as well as measures to generate more risk capital investments.

Through the EU financial instruments of the Competitiveness and Innovation Framework Programme a sizeable sum of money has been made available to help SMEs across the EU to access loans and equity to grow and develop their business. These EU financial instruments are operated by the European Investment Fund in cooperation with national, regional and local financial institutions, which comprise the interface with the customer groups.

There are also other EU programmes with measures specially designed for SMEs: Seventh Framework Programme for research and technological development, Jeremie programme and Eurostars project (more)

Source

Beijing, September 29, 2009 – Spot Infoterra, a world leader in the field of geo-information products and services, and a division of Astrium Services, today announced the signing of a major agreement with MAG Group in China.


Through this agreement MAG Group and its subsidiary will promote a range of Spot Infoterra products and services:
• The Pixel FactoryTM – a revolutionary, multi-sensor and multi-resolution processing suite
ISTAR Telecom products – a range of datasets dedicated to wireless telecommunication planning
• Global Seeps – offshore oil seepage data for oil exploration and pollution information for environmental studies
• The maritime application services

A dedicated team at MAG Group will be set-up to ensure these marketing activities, and will initially focus on maritime surveillance services, oil and gas exploration and infrastructure network planning, markets where MAG Group has in-depth knowledge and experience on both private and public sectors.

“China has an expanding economy in which geo-information is already playing a major role. We are delighted that MAG Group will help to support our customers and business in China. We see this as the first step towards building a strong commercial relationship with MAG Group and Beijing Tek Meridian” commented Marc Tondriaux, Spot Infoterra CEO.
“We are confident that the collaboration between our organizations will bring new business opportunities for all of us and also help the development of MAG Group in the market sector we are targeting,” said Liu Tao, General Manager Beijing Tek Meridian.

MAG Group, founded in 1994, has an extensive experience in introducing foreign advanced technologies and products to the China market and a nationwide sales and service network. Along with its subsidiary Beijing Tek Meridian System Solution Corp,
MAG Group delivers a range of services including surveying GPS, GIS, mining, navigation, pipeline and marine services.
Spot Infoterra has a well-established presence in China, through Beijing Spot Image (a joint-venture between Spot Image and CEODE created in 1998) and the opening of an Infoterra representation office in 2006.

About Spot Infoterra

Spot Infoterra is a global provider of geo-information products and services bringing
decision-makers sustainable solutions to increase our security, protect the environment and monitor natural resources.

With unique access to SPOT and TerraSAR-X satellites, and a broad range of spaceborne and
airborne acquisition capabilities, the group offers an unrivalled combination of Earth imagery.

This combination forms the solid base for an extensive portfolio of products and services spanning the entire geo-information value chain. Furthermore, building on synergies within Astrium Services, Spot Infoterra develops innovative and highly-competitive end-to-end solutions combining Earth observation, navigation and worldwide communications capabilities.

Combining the talent and capabilities of Spot Image and Infoterra, with a turnover of 160 M Euro in 2008 and more than 800 staff, Spot Infoterra is established in twelve countries and is part of Astrium Services, an EADS Astrium subsidiary.

Media contact
Sarah Haslam (Infoterra)
+44(0)116 273 2300
sarah.haslam@infoterra-global.com
Anne-Marie Bernard (Spot Image)
+33(0)5 62 19 40 10
anne-marie.bernard@spotimage.fr
Fabienne Grazzini (Infoterra)
+33(0)5 62 19 63 26
fabienne.grazzini@infoterra-global.com