College of Sciences

Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences

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Laboratory for Remote Sensing and Geoinformatics

News

Click on year to see the news for that year.

  • August 2021 — PhD students Younghyun Koo and Hazem Mahmoud part of GEE-ISD team that placed third in NSIN Polar Vortex Hackathon.
  • July 2021 — Dr. Xie featured in COS Faculty Spotlight.
  • January 2021 — PhD student Younghyun Koo participated in an IPCC Group Review.
  • July 2019 — Dr. Xie leads UTSA team in $3M NASA award to develop Center for Advanced Measurements in Extreme Environments, see UTSA Today for details.
  • July 2019 — ICESat-2 overview and processing
  • April 2019 — PhD student Jullian Williams, under the supervision of Dr. Xie, placed third in the 2019 3MT Research competition hosted by the UTSA Graduate School. Her presentation title was "A nexus between polar ice and tropical climate with the use of sentinel SAR satellite data."
  • February 2019 — PI Stephen Ackley and co-PIs Drs. Blake Weissling and Hongjie Xie: Greenland Circumnavigation Expedition (GLACE) project "Sea Ice Thickness under Arctic Climate Change."
  • February 2019 — UTSA project (PIs: Ackley, Weissling, Xie) is one of fifteen selected to participate in the Greenland Circumnavigation Expedition (GLACE), funded by Swiss Polar Foundation, for better understanding the Arctic environment affected by climate change. Dr. Weissling will be on the expedition August and September 2019.
  • October 2018 — We are looking for a graduate/PhD student to work on an NSF-funded project. Please let Dr. Xie or Dr. Mestas know if you have any questions.
  • June 2018 — A video refresh of field work on Ross Sea fast ice near McMurdo Station, Nov 2017, through the PolarTrec Program.
  • May 27-June 1, 2018 — Dr. Xie attended the MOSAiC planning workshop in Potsdam, Germany. Dr. Xie is collaborating with Peking University for contributing two GNSS-R stations (for studying snow, ice, and precipitable water vapor) to the one year experiment of the Arctic sea ice from Sept 2019-Oct 2010.
  • May 2018 — Call papers for a special issue in Remote Sensing on "Imaging floods and glacier geohazards with remote sensing" (deadline March 31, 2019), co-edited by Drs. Cigna, Xie, and Chokmani.
  • October-November 2017 — Dr. Xie, Dr. Gao, and Jennifer conducted sea ice field work in McMurdo Sound, Antarctic, as part of the PIPERS program funded by NSF. Jennifer Bault (from Wisconsin) is a PolarTREC teacher who wrote daily fantastic Blog to her students and the world.
  • September 8, 2017 — UTSA geologist Dr. Hincapie talks about southern Mexico earthquake (magnitude 8.1, September 7, 2017) on San Antonio News 4.
  • September 2017 — Dr. Xie approved as the NASA's ICESat-2 Early Adopter for using ICESat-2 for improving NIC's operational ice charts and products.
  • August 14-19, 2017 —- Dr. Xie and LRSG team (Dai, Wang, Li, Liu) attended the IGS Polar and Climate conference at Boulder, CO.
  • August 8-10, 2017 — Dr. Xie attended NASA SnowEX workshop at Longmont, CO.
  • August 2017 — Call papers for a special issue in Remote Sensing (IF=3.244) on "Remote sensing water cycle: theory, sensors, data and applications" (deadline 31 August 2018), co-edited by Drs. Hong, Xie, Wan, and Hasan.
  • April-June 2017 — LRSG scientists Ackley and Weissling are conducting scientific expedition onboard N. B. Palmer in Ross Sea of Antarctic. Ackley is the lead scientist of the expedition with about 25 scientists from USA and Belgium to study sea ice, ocean and atmosphere interaction (real time).
  • March 14, 2017 — Our former PhD student Burcu Ozsoy, now a leader of Antarctic research at Istanbul Technical University, featured in UTSA Today.
  • March 3-4, 2017 — Dr. Xie attended the international workshop (Beijing, China) on High Mountain and Cold Regions (HiMAC), a task force of Digital Belt and Road (DBAR). The discussion resulted in a white paper both in English and Chinese. Xie was one of the 18 co-authors for the white paper.
  • October-November 2016 — Dr. Xie and PhD student Liuxi Tian conducted sea ice field work in McMurdo Sound, Antarctic, as part of the PIPERS program funded by NSF (lead PI Ackley). The field work was in collaboration with a New Zealand team (lead PI Langhorne) and LDEO-IcePod flights (lead PI Bell).
  • October 2016 — The graduate catalog and flyer of the newly approved Geoinformatics graduate program are available for recruitment purposes.
  • September 20, 2016 — UTSA Today reports the new Geoinformatics graduate program to start in fall 2017. Dr. Xie is the founding director of the program.
  • September 2016 — Call papers for a special issue of Water (IF=1.687) on "Applications of Remote Sensing/GIS in Water Resources and Flooding Risk Managements" to be co-edited by Drs. Xie and Wang.
  • June 13-17, 2016 — Week-long teachers workshop on earth and environmental sciences supported by the MSEIP Progam.
  • April 10-14, 2016 — Dr. Xie and LRSG students Shuang and Liuxi attend the ASPRS annual meeting, Fort Worth, TX.
  • April 9, 2016 — MSEIP students field trip to local geology, hydrology and water facility led by Dr. Gao.
  • February 21-15, 2016 — LRSG scientists Ackley, Weissling, and Xie attend the AGU Ocean Science conference and the NSF-funded PIPERS project meeting, New Orleans, LA.
  • November 23, 2015 — The DoEd grant for minority research/education is in UTSA Today.
  • November 9, 2015 — GIS Day at UTSA.
  • November 2015 — LRSG scientists Ackley and Weissling return to campus after a 45 day field trip/cruise with R/V Sikuliaq to the Arctic Ocean in better understanding the autumn sea ice advance and role of waves in the Arctic Ocean.
  • November 2015 — UTSA Geological Sciences in 2015 GSA TV.
  • September 2015 — LRSG receives $749K DoEd grant to support minority research and education.
  • June 23, 2015 — LRSG receiving $20K UTSA seed funding to study paleo-lake shorelines of Tibetan Plateau featured in UTSA Today.
  • June 2015 — LRSG receives $661K NSF funding to study Antarctic (Ross Sea) polynyas and sea ice.
  • May 11, 2015 — LRSG scientists Ackley and Weissling in UTSA Today for the upcoming Arctic expedition (Oct-Nov 2015) funded by ONR.
  • December 15-19, 2014 — Steve Ackley and Dr. Xie attended the AGU fall meeting in San Francisco, CA and presented 7 papers (for students and with collaborators).
  • December 2014 — Congratulations to Dr. Xie for being promoted to full professor!
  • December 2014 — The special session/issue on Progress in Snow Remote Sensing in the Journal of Applied Remote Sensing edited by Drs. Xie, Huang, and Liang is finished, with 20 papers published.
  • November 2014 — New PhD assistantships are available in LRSG/UTSA starting Fall 2015.
  • October 8, 2014 — Dr. Xie gave a talk at the UTSA Geology Graduate Seminar series.
  • Summer 2014 — Dr. Xie visited China for collaborative research, presentation, and conference:
    • May 26-29 — gave talk at the Dragon 3 Mid-term Results International Symposium, Chengdu
    • June 3 — invited talk at Dalian University of Technology, Dalian
    • June 19 — invited talk at Sun Yat-sen University, Guangzhou
    • June 30-July 2 — invited talk at the IPACES 2014 meeting, Beijing
    • July 4 — invited talk at National Marine Environmental Forecasting Center, Beijing
    • July 9 — invited talk at Institute of Remote Sensing and Digital Earth, CAS, Beijing
    • July 15 — invited talk at Lanzhou University, Lanzhou
    • July 15-26 — led a field investigation on lakes over Tibetan Plateau, funded by NSFC Oversea Collaborative Fund
    • July 17 — invited talk at Tibet Bureau of Meteorology, Lhasa
    • July 28 — invited talk at the CAERRRI, CAS, Lanzhou
  • March 22-April 5, 2014 — Professors Zhijun Li and Peng Lu from Dalian University of Technology visited LRSG for collaborative research and publications; funded by the Chinese Arctic and Antarctic Administration (CAA).
  • March 21, 2014 — Dr. Xie gave an invited talk on "Increased mass over Tibetan Plateau: from glaciers or lakes?" at the Central Michigan University Department of Geography.
  • March 9-16, 2014 — Steve Ackley and Dr. Xie attended the IGS sea ice conference in Hobart, Australia and presented 7 papers.
  • February 2014 — Dr. Xie and LRSG teaming up with the Texas Sustainable Energy Research Institute to work on the solar energy mapping and forecasting project. The project is supporting a few graduate students and will support a new PhD student starting the fall 2014 semester.
  • January 31, 2014 — Dr. Xie gave a talk in the UTSA's ESE graduate seminar.
  • January 28-29, 2014 — Dr. Xie attended the the annual PARCA and OIB (Operational IceBridge) workshop at the NASA/GSFC, and presented a talk on the improvement of automated local sea level retrieval from ATM L1B data.
  • December 9-13, 2013 — Dr. Xie and LRSG students Yunbo, Qian, David, and Wentao attended the AGU fall meeting in San Francisco, CA and presented 4 papers. Dr. Xie co-chaired one session on Remote Sensing of the Terrestrial Water Cycle.
  • November 2013 — PhD assistantship for Sea Ice Remote Sensing is available at LRSG/UTSA.
  • October 2013 — Opening position: Hydrologist and Departmental Chair at the UTSA Department of Geological Sciences.
  • October 2013 — Annual undergraduate research presentations (MORESE colloquium) is held in the main campus. It is organized by Dr. Xie and supported by the U.S. Department of Education and the UTSA College of Sciences.
  • September 2013 — LRSG graduate student Chase Mueller is an intern in the NASA/Ames Research Center working on a project "Fire and ice wars: battles in the Sierra Nevada Mt." Their project won the "Best in Show."
  • September 2013 — SPIE Newsroom highlights a recent work that Dr. Xie coauthored on the groundwater increase due to the construction of Three Gorges Dam/Reservoir (China).
  • August 2013 — A special issue/section on Progress in Snow Remote Sensing in the Journal of Applied Remote Sensing is now calling for papers (deadline Dec 1, 2013). Dr. Xie and two scientists in China are the guest editors for the special issue.
  • June 15-August 10, 2013 — Dr. Xie visited China for collaborative research, presentation and conference:
    • June 20-22 — gave talk and chaired a session at the CPGIS Geoinformatics conference in Kaifeng
    • June 24 and July 15-19 — invited talk and lectures at Nanjing University
    • July 1 — invited talk in East China Institute of Technology
    • July 11-12 — invited talk in the Tibetan Plateau Climate/Weather Datasets conference in Xining
    • July 22 — invited talk in Central South University
    • August 1-2 — invited talk and chaired session at the First Chinese Snow Remote Sensing conference, Lanzhou
  • May 15-29, 2013 — Dr. Xie participated the joint Canada, China, and USA field campaign of sea ice in the Resolute Bay (Canada) to test different geophysical instruments for sea ice thickness measurements. (photo showcase)
  • April 29-May 1, 2013 — Dr. Xie attended the NASA IDS projects meeting in the Auburn University for discussion and collaboration.
  • April 26, 2013 — Newfel Mazari successfully defended his dissertation "Uncertainty of remote sensing precipitation estimates." His committee consisted of Drs. Hatim Sharif, Hongjie Xie, Alan Dutton, Drew Johnson, and Yongli Gao. Congratulations!!
  • April 2013 — The LSRG lab has a couple of $1000 scholarships funded by a NASA grant for students who are interested in graduate study of remote sensing applications in UTSA. To compete, please email a statement of interest/qualification/proposed study, at least one reference letter, and a CV to Dr. Xie by May 5.
  • March 10-15, 2013 — Dr. Xie, Steve Ackley, and LRSG students David and Wentao attended the Gordon Research Conferece: Polar Marine Science at Ventura, CA and presented 4 papers.
  • January 29-30, 2013 — Dr. Xie attended the PARCA and IceBridge workshops in NASA/Goddard and presented one oral and one poster presentation.
  • December 2-7, 2012 — Steve Ackley, Dr. Xie, and LRSG students Newfel, David, and Wentao attended the AGU fall meeting in San Francisco, CA and presented 5 papers. Steve also co-chaired one session on Arctic and Antarctic Sea Ice Processes.
  • November 2012 — Dr. Christian Haas gives a Dean's Distinguished Lecture on Nov 29, entitled "Arctic sea ice: Where are we headed?"
  • September 20-21, 2012 — Dr. Xie, as a member of the NASA's Surface Mass Balance and snow on sea ice (SUMup) working group supported by NASA, to attend the first meeting in Goddard Space Flight Center.
  • August 27, 2012 — LRSG graduate student Chase Mueller finished his summer intern at NASA/Langley Research Center working on a project "applying NASA Aquarius sensor for Amazon river plume."
  • July 30-August 2, 2012 — UTSA/LRSG/Geological Sciences offers GIS/RS workshops for K-12 teachers, publics, companies, and governmental agencies.
  • July 12-August 15, 2012 — LRSG graduate student Yunbo Bi participated the HiWATER field campaign in China to develop her dissertation study on remote sensing of surface hydrology for Heihe River watershed.
  • June 30-August 9, 2012 — Dr. Xie visited China for collaborative research, presentation and conference:
    • July 2-5 — invited talk at the IPACES 2012 meeting in Guangzhou
    • July 12-27 — visited CAREERI, CAS and Lanzhou University and participated the HiWATER field campaign (invited by Dr. Xin Li) and visited Nanjing University in Nanjing and other agencies/institutions in Beijing
  • June 21-22, 2012 — Dr. Xie attended the first Suomi-NPP workshop, funded by the NASA Applied Science Program, in Washington DC.
  • June 18-22, 2012 — We successfully held the third NASA's Teachers Workshop funded by a NASA grant to UTSA. 20 teachers from San Antonio and other areas attended the unique workshop focused on Polar and Planetary Sciences.
  • June-August, 2012 — LRSG graduate student Chase Mueller participating the NASA DEVELOP Internship program at the Langley Research Center, working on a project entitled "Brazil Oceans: Using NASA's Aquarius Satellite to Monitor Salinity Levels in the Amazon Delta."
  • May 7, 2012 — MORESE/LRSG student Jessica Jimenez is in UTSA Today's Commencement Close-Up. Congratulations!!
  • April 23-27, 2012 — Steve Ackley, Dr. Blake Weissling, and UTSA PhD candidate in Education Annie Weissling attended the second conference on the International Polar Year 2012, From Knowledge to Action, in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. Steve Ackley and Dr. Weissling presented talks in the sessions on Polar Technology and Polar Remote Sensing and Observing Systems. Steve also chaired a session there and Annie presented in the Educational/Outreach sessions on using our polar expedition activities in K-12 classroom teaching.
  • April 9, 2012 — Dr. Xie gave an invited talk "Sea ice and glacier lake dynamics under global warming using in-situ and remote sensing data" at the Climate Forum of the UT Austin Geological Sciences Department.
  • March 27-29, 2012 — Steve Ackley attended a workshop on the Ross Sea in La Jolla, CA, in developing the US submission for the designation of a Marine Protected Area for the Ross Sea, Antarctica by the international group CCAMLR. He presented and discussed the sea ice environment of the Ross Sea and how changes in the sea ice cover impact the marine ecosystem and fishing activities in the Ross Sea, to be included in the workshop report, which will be part of the CCAMLR submission as justification for the Marine Protected Area designation for the Ross Sea.
  • March 18-19, 2012 — Dr. Xie attended the CRISM user's workshop and 43 LPSC at the Woodland, TX.
  • March 7-9, 2012 — Wentao attended the 42th Annual International Arctic Workshop at Winter Park, Colorado. He presented one paper.
  • February 2012 — Steve Ackley has been appointed to the 12-member international Scientific Steering Committee (SSC) for the Southern Ocean Observing System (SOOS). The Southern Ocean has several key climate-related processes ongoing, yet it is not well sampled nor observed. SOOS was established to develop the monitoring and observing system to see the response of the Southern Ocean to climate change. He attended the first meeting of the Science Steering Committee on February 18-19 in Salt Lake City, UT prior to the biennial AGU-ASLO Ocean Sciences Meeting meeting held there the following week.
  • December 5-9, 2011 — Steve Ackley, Dr. Xie, Dr. Huajun, and LRSG students Alex, Anthony, Ben, Shelby, David, Newfel, and Almoutaz attend the AGU fall meeting at San Francisco, and presented over 10 posters and talks. Steve Ackley and Dr. Xie also co-convened two AGU sessions (C23-Antarctic and Arctic sea ice processes; H21-Recent advances in data assimilation and remote sensing for land surface hydrology).
  • December 2011 — Dr. Xie's Arctic Expedition appears in the 2011 UTSA Discovery magazine.
  • December 2011 — Mike and Marius on the SwRI news "Seeing sea ice," reporting some research progress from ICEBell and Oden Cruises in 2010, when LRSG/UTSA (Mike, Blake, and David) participated the cruises and collected data.
  • December 2011 — SPIE Newsroom highlights our recent lake level work on the Tibetan Plateau.
  • November 2011 — MORESE calls for student applications for research experience in summer 2012; it is due on January 16, 2012.
  • October 31-November 1, 2011 — Drs. Xie and Weissling attend the CliC sea ice working group workshop in Boulder, CO and present our recent Arctic work and Automated camera system development and idea.
  • October 24-28, 2011 — Steve Ackley attends the WCRP conference in Denver, CO and gives a poster presentation on Antarctic sea ice thickness from field measurements.
  • October 24, 2011 — Dr. Xie gives an invited talk at the TAMUK's Environmental Engineering graduate seminar on Glacier lakes and snow cover dynamics in Tibetan Plateau using field and remote sensing data.
  • September 23, 2011 — Annual MORESE Colloquium: faculty and students are welcomed to attend and relax for the afternoon; refreshments and pizzas will be served (sponsored by the Center for Water Research).
  • September 9, 2011 — Dr. Xie gives a talk at the UTSA ESE graduate seminar on Glacier lakes and snow cover dynamics in Tibetan Plateau using field and remote sensing data.
  • September 1, 2011 — Dr. Xie gives a talk at the UTSA SGS (Student Geological Society) meeting about his Arctic trip in summer 2010.
  • June 22-July 28, 2011 — Dr. Xie visited China for collaborative research, presentation and conference:
    • June 24-26 — attended CPGIS conference and chaired two sessions and presented two papers.
    • June 27 — (morning) invited by Dr. Shunggen Jin, Xie visited Dr. Jin's lab at the Shanghai Astronomical Observatory and discussed mutual research interests and possible collaborations.
    • June 27 — (afternoon) invited by Dr. Ruibo Lei, Xie visited and gave a talk at the Polar Research Institute of China.
    • June 28-29 — invited by Dr. Changqin Ke, visited and gave a talk at the Nanjing University
    • June 30 — invited by Dr. Tao Che, gave a talk at the CAREERI, CAS
    • June 30-July 12 — invited by Dr. Tiangang Liang, visited/presented/worked in Lanzhou University
    • July 20-21 — invited by Dr. Huade Guan, visited Hunan Normal University and discussed mutual research interest and possible collaborations
    • July 26 — invited by Drs. Yao Gao and Shichang Kang, gave a talk at the Institute of Tibetan Plateau Research, visited Beijing Research Institute of Geology and Chinese Arctic and Antarctic Administration, and met many friends and colleagues
  • June 6-10, 2011 — We successfully held the second NASA's Teachers Workshop funded by two NASA grants to UTSA. 20 teachers from San Antonio and other areas attended the unique workshop focused on Polar and Planetary Sciences.Congratulations!!
  • June 2011 — LRSG researchers convene/co-convene fall 2011 AGU sessions - C04: Antarctic sea ice processes and climate (ASPeCt) (Ackley); C29: Rapid changing sea ice in Arctic ocean under global warming (Xie); H95: New and emerging satellite missions for remote sensing hydrology (Xie).
  • Summer 2011 — Dr. Xie's 2010 Arctic trip featured in the College of Sciences magazine, Catalyst.
  • May 8-June 17, 2011 — Dr. Xie visited NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center Cryosphere Science Branch for collaborative research. His visit was funded by a NASA education grant to UTSA (PI Sharif). Dr. Xie gave a talk "Sea ice, snow cover and glacier lakes dynamics using field and remote sensing data" in the Branch on June 10. Anthony Arricale, a undergraduate student also funded by the grant, is visiting there from June 1 to July 29 under the supervision of John Bolten at the Hydrological Science Branch.
  • April 2011 — UTSA logo on the cover page of special issue on Antarctic sea ice at the Deep Sea Research II. UTSA/LRSG has co-authored 7 papers plus editorial. Congratulations to LRSG/UTSA!!
  • March 2011 — The paper of Xie, H., X. Zhou, E. Vivoni, J. Hendrickx, and E. Small, 2005. GIS Based NEXRAD Precipitation Database: automated approaches for data processing and visualization (pdf), published in Computers and Geosciences is named as The Most Cited Article 2005-2010 of the Journal. Congratulations!!
  • March 20-25, 2011 — Steve Ackley, Dr. Xie, and LRSG students Wentao and Mike attended the Gordon Research Conference Polar Marine Science at Ventura, CA and presented four papers there. Our former graduate student Penelope Wagner chaired the Gordon-Kenan Research Seminar.
  • February 1-3, 2011 — Dr. Xie attends the Cryosat Validation Workshop at ESRIN/ESA, Frascati (Rome), Italy and presents one paper.
  • January 2011 — SPIE Optical Engineering + Applications Conference will be held in San Diego, CA, August 21-25. Abstract due Feb 7 and full paper due July 27. Dr. Xie is the program committee member for "Remote sensing and modeling of ecosystems for sustainability VIII" under the Remote Sensing program. You are invited to present your research there.
  • January 2011 — CPGIS's annual conference "The 19th International Conference on GeoInformatics" will be held in Shanghai, China, June 24-26, 2011. Abstract submission is due January 30. Dr. Xie is co-organizing two special sessions (SS06) "Remote sensing data for hydrological applications" and (SS08) "Remote sensing and climate change." You are invited to present your papers in the special sessions.
  • December 2010-January 2011 — Dr. Weissling and David Prado are participating the fifth NSF-funded ODEN expedition to West Antarctic from Chile to McMurdo Station. This is the fifth ship-based sea ice expedition of LRSG. Dr. Xie and Burcu participated the first ODEN expedition to the same place in December 2006.
  • December 13-17, 2010 — Steve Ackley, Dr. Xie, and LRSG students Guoqing and Singaiah attended the fall AGU meeting at San Francisco, CA and presented four papers. Dr. Xie and his CPGIS Get-together Committee organized the second CPGIS reception in AGU.
  • December 10, 2010 — Ackley/LRSG/UTSA team on the Oden expedition 2010-2011 from Chile to McMurdo on The Antarctic Sun news.
  • December 3, 2010 — Steve Ackley coauthored a letter in Science "Fishing for Data in the Ross Sea,". The letter expresses their objection to the eco-certification of Ross Sea Antarctic toothfish.
  • November-December 2010 — Mike Lewis is participating the JC Ross Ice Breaker (British Antarctic Survey) to the West Weddell Sea and East Bellingshausen Sea of Antarctic. This is the fourth ship-based sea ice expedition of the LRSG/UTSA and the second of the year. Mike's participant is also supported by a SwRI's IR&D Research project "Antarctic sea ice thickness from airborne LiDAR and ultra-wideband radar" (PIs Lewis and Necsoiu, UTSA collaborators Xie and Ackley).
  • November 30, 2010 — Dr. Xie's Arctic expedition on UTSA Today.
  • October 25-26, 2010 — Dr. Stefan Kern from University of Hamburg, Germany visited LRSG and gave two lectures on Microwave remote sensing of sea ice in Xie's remote sensing class and worked extensively with LRSG students on ENVIsat data processing and problem solving.
  • October 22, 2010 — Mike Lewis successfully defended his dissertation "Antarctic snow and sea ice processes: Effects on passive microwave emissions and AMSR-E sea ice products." His committee consisted of Hongjie Xie, Steve Ackley, Alan Dutton, Hatim Sharif, and Thorsten Markus. Congratulations!!
  • September 2010 — A project entitled "Minority Opportunities for Research Experience in Earth Science and Environmental Engineering at the University of Texas at San Antonio" (MORESE at UTSA) is approved for funding by The US Department of Education MSEIP program (2010-2013, PIs: Xie, Lambert, and Sharif). This continues our first MORE Science project (2005-2009) to support minorities for research experiences. Congratulations!!
  • July-September 2010 — Dr. Xie invited to attend the 4th Chinese Arctic Expedition (Xuelong) to study Arctic sea ice, the most impacted one due to global warming. This is the first time that the LRSG/UTSA extends its sea ice study from Antarctic to Arctic and the third time that LRSG participates in a ship-based polar expedition to collect rich sea ice geophysic data and for validation of satellite-derived geophysical products. The participation gives LRSG an unprecedented opportunity to collaborate with Chinese scientists for polar study. Dr. Xie's participation is partially supported by NOAA's Sea Ice Outlook Program.
  • July 2010 — AGU Hydrology Section Newsletter.
  • June 21-25, 2010 — We successfully held the first NASA's Teachers Workshop funded by two NASA grants to UTSA. 23 teachers from San Antonio and other areas attended the unique workshop focused on Polar and Planetary Sciences. Congratulations!!
  • May 30-June 12, 2010 — Steve Ackley, Dr. Weissling, and LRSG students Burcu, Ahmet, and Mike attended the IGS (Tromso) and IPY (Oslo) conferences and presented over 10 papers.
  • May 20, 2010 — Burcu successfully defended her dissertation "Estimation of Antarctic sea ice properties using surface and space borne data." Her committee consisted of Hongjie Xie, Steve Ackley, Keying Ye, Hatim Sharif, and Jay Zwally. Congratulations!!
  • April 20, 2010 — Dr. Weissling and PhD student Mike Lewis study Mexico/tropical glacier on UTSA Today.
  • April 2010 — A project entitled "Developing and applying an integrated multi-scale Earth system modeling framework to study the impacts of changing climate, local weather, and land use and watersheds and downstream coastal ecosystems& has been approved for funding (2010-2013) by NASA IDS Program. Dr. Xie is one of the 7 Co-PIs for the project led by Dr. Zong-Liang Yang at UT Austin. This is a continuation of the first IDS project of the same Team. Congratulations!! A graduate research scholarship is available for application. Please ask Dr. Xie for details.
  • April 2010 — Graduate student David Prado awarded the Dean's Fund for Excellence Award ($1000) for graduate students. Congratulations!!
  • April 2010 — NASA approves our supplement for education proposal to our NASA project for Antarctic Sea Ice study. The education project is to develop "Polar and Planetary Sciences Modules for K-12 Teachers," (2010-2011, PI Ackley, CoPIs Xie and Fies). Congratulations!!
  • March 15-19, 2010 — Our ISSI workshop of "Monitoring Arctic and Antarctic sea ice from various satellite products" successfully held in Bern, Switzerland. Burcu and Dr. Xie were the co-leaders.
  • February 9, 2010 — Steve Ackley gave an invited talk at the Texas A&M Galveston. His title was "Antarctic Sea Ice: From the Megascale to Microscale--Climatic Interactions over ten orders of magnitude."
  • January 26, 2010 — Dr. Xie gave an invited talk at the San Antonio Chapter of the IEEE Computer Society's monthly seminar series. His title was "Automated computation and batch processing for remote sensing data and application."
  • January 21, 2010 — Steve Ackley gave the first seminar in the series established at Southwest Research Institute as part of their new Climate Change Initiative. The talk was titled "Antarctic Sea Ice: From the Megascale to Microscale - Climatic Interactions over Ten Orders of Magnitude."
  • December 14-18, 2009 — Steve Ackley and Dr.Xie attended the fall AGU meeting in San Francisco, CA and presented three papers. Dr. Xie co-chaired three sub-sessions of the Application of Hydrological Remote Sensing Data session and organized the CPGIS reception in AGU for the first time. LRSG students Ahmet, Almoutaz, Newfel, and Wenlong also attended the AGU meeting.
  • December 2009 — NASA website showing current and past ice extents of polar regions in SCAR report on Climate Change in Antarctica.
  • December 2009 — NATO (The North Atlantic Treaty Organization) published the book entitled "Building Safer Communities. Risk Governance, Spatial Planning and Responses to Natural Hazards." This book contains the invited chapter "Use of Emerging InSAR and LiDAR Remote Sensing Technologies to Anticipate and Monitor Critical Natural Hazards," having authors M. Necsoiu and D. Hooper (SwRI). M. Necsoiu is a Adjunct Professor of UTSA/LRSG.
  • December 2009 — Mike Lewis awarded a $1500 UTSA Mexico Center Educational Research Fellowship to study a tropic glacier in Mexico. Congratulations!!
  • December 2009 — Dr. Xie was informed of approval for promotion to Associate Professor with tenure. Congratulations!!
  • December 2009 — "Monitoring Arctic and Antarctic sea ice from various satellite products" workshop, sponsored by the International Space Science Institute (ISSI), will be held from 15-19 March 2010 at Bern, Switzerland. This workshop is organized by Burcu and Dr. Xie. Travel support for the participants is funded by a NASA grant to UTSA (PI Ackley, #NNX08AQ87G).
  • November 16-19, 2009 — Dr. Xie and LRSG students Burcu, Mark,and Ahmet attended the ASPRS/MAPPS fall conference in San Antonio and presented 4 papers. Mark served as a session chair for the Land Use/Land Cover session. Other students/staff (Guoqing, Wenlong, Chaojun) also joined the conference. Both Burcu and Mark received Mid-South Student Awards for their oral presentations. Congratulations!
  • November 18, 2009 — ASPRS UTSA Chapter and LRSG exhibited our geospatial related works and the Department of Geological Sciences to hundreds of San Antonio school kids at the San Antonio GIS Day. Thanks to graduate students Newfel and Guoqing for their time and hard work.
  • October 18, 2009 — The fourth Annual LRSG picnic held at the Lewis's house. Thanks a lot to the Lewis's family and co-organizers Burcu and Mike. We had great time!
  • October 2, 2009 — Steve's quotes on "Valero says proposed climate bill would kill US refinery industry" published in the San Antonio Business Journal. Steve argued that ~99% scientists believe that CO2 is the a major contributor to the global warming problem. Steve said "The argument that CO2 is good for plants is beside the point. Water is good for plants too, but floods are still bad."
  • September 25-26, 2009 — Steve was invited to visit Los Alamos National Lab and gave a seminar "Antarctic Sea Ice, Results from the IPY cruises." He consulted with members of the Ocean Modeling Group on the integration of Antarctic sea ice physics, geophysics and biogeochemistry observations into the Global Climate Models that LANL is responsible for developing for Dept of Energy in collaboration with the National Center for Atmospheric Research.
  • September 2009 — LRSG awarded a NSF grant ($340K, PI Ackley, Co-PIs Xie and Nowak) to go back to Antarctic again (November 2010-January 2011) for significant field work on sea ice study. This will be the third expedition since LRSG participated the ODEN expedition in 2006 and the SIMBA/NB Palmer expedition in 2007. Congratulations!
  • September 1-3, 2009 — Steve Ackley, Dr. Xie, Dr. Tekeli, and LRSG student Burcu attended ODEN Southern Ocean workshop (collaboration, data integration and publication) at the University of Georgia, hosted by Professor Tish Yager and funded by NSF.
  • August 7-27, 2009 — Dr. Xie visited China for collaborative research, presentation and conference:
    • August 12 — invited by Dr. Zhijun Li, gave talk on Antarctic expeditions and sea ice physical properties from space and field measurements, at the School of Civil and Hydraulic Engineering, Dalian University of Technology
    • August 13 — invited by Dr. Jinping Zhao, gave the same talk at the College of Physical and Environmental Oceanography, Ocean University of China and, invited by Dr. Na Liu, visited and discussed possible projects at the First Institute of Oceanography of SOA
    • August 15-20 — invited by Dr. Tandong Yao at Institute of Tibetan Plateau Research, CAS, gave a talk MODIS and ICESat-based snow cover and glacier changes across three rivers headstream region of Tibetan Plateau, at the International Workshop on Third Pole Environment, Beijing-Lhasa, China
    • August 21-26 — invited by Dr. Tiangang Liang at Lanzhou University and for collaborative research, gave three extensive lectures for a large group of faculty and students: (1) New progress of remote sensing of snow cover and snow water equivalent based on MODIS and AMSR-E; (2) Snow cover spatial and temporal variability across three rivers headstream region of Tibetan Plateau based on MODIS data (2000-2008); and (3) ICESat for studying lake level and glacial elevation changes
  • August 4-6, 2009 — Dr. Xie attended the SPIE remote sensing and modeling of ecosystems for sustainability conference in San Diego, CA. Xie was the program committee member and session chair. Xie gave one invited talk and one poster presentation.
  • July 19-24, 2009 — Steve Ackley invited to give a talk "Antarctic sea ice: International Polar Year cruises" in the MOCA-09 meeting in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. This is the joint congress between three international associations that is held every 2 years: Intl Assoc of Meteorolgy and Atomospheric Physics (IAMAP), Intl Assoc of Physical Sciences of the Ocean (IAPSO), and Intl Assoc of Cryospheric Sciences (IACS), a newly formed (this is their first meeting) one.
  • July 2009 — A fall AGU session "Applications of Hydrologic Remote Sensing Data" is approved. Dr. Xie is one of the conveners. Congratulations! You are cordially invited to submit abstracts to the session due on September 3, 2009 (23:59 ET).
  • June 10-12, 2009 — Steve Ackley invited to give two speeches at the 16th International Symposium on Polar Sciences: Polar Exploration with ARAON (a brand new icebreaker in Korea), at Incheon, Korea. Steve further discussed with Korea scientists for possible participations to Araon's Antarctic and Arctic cruises in near future.
  • June 8, 2009 — LRSG/UTSA researches/publications highlighted in the NOTUS of the AGCS Newsletter in the June 2009 issue.
  • June 2009 — Our team (leaders Burcu and Dr. Xie) workshop proposal entitled "Monitoring Arctic and Antarctic sea ice from various satellite products" approved for implementation by the International Space Science Institute (ISSI) at Bern, Switzerland. The ISSI will provide expenses for all participants (12-15 persons) except for the air tickets which will be funded by our NASA project. The workshop is planned for early 2010 at the ISSI. Congratulations!
  • June 2009 — A project entitled "A collaborative geospatial decision support system for managing coastal river basins" has been approved for funding by NASA Applied Sciences Program. Dr. Xie is one of the 4 PIs for the project led by Dr. Alex Sun at Southwest Research Institute (SwRI). Congratulations!
  • June 2009 — Burcu awarded a University Teaching Fellowship ($25K for academic year 2009-2010) to improve her professional development. Congratulations!
  • May 27, 2009 — Penny Wagner, our geology graduate student, awarded a NASA Earth and Space Science Fellowship (NESSF) for the research proposal "The development of NASA QuickSCAT Scatterometer data to detect sea ice extent and variability in the Antarctic" (advisors Xie and Ackley). This grant will support her $30K per year for 3 years to do the research. Congratulations to her and the LRSG! (She will be able to take the grant to the University Delaware for her PhD study with changed advisors. We wish her the best future!)
  • May 21, 2009 — Mark Schnur, our ES graduate student and ESE PhD student soon, is in UTSA Today's Commencement Close-Up.
  • April 3, 2009 — Steve speaks in the NEWSFOCUS article "Cold Equations" of the Science Magazine.
  • March 22-27, 2009 — Chaojun attended the 40th LPSC in Houston, Texas and presented one paper.
  • March 20-26, 2009 — Dr. Xie attended the PAG (Pacific Arctic Group) and ASSW (Arctic Science Summit Week) meetings and made important contacts with the PAG for possible opportunities to join their future ship expeditions to Arctic and Antarctic.
  • March 14-25, 2009 — Steve Ackley, Dr. Weissling, and LRSG students Penny, Elizabeth, Burcu, Mike, and Ahmet attended the Gordon Research Conference (Polar Marine Science) and Antarctic Sea Ice Workshop at the Lucca (Barga), Italy, and presented 7 research papers. Steve Ackley co-chaired both conference/workshop. Blake won one of the three best poster presentations. Congratulations!!
  • March 9-13, 2009 — Beibei Yu represented the LRSG/ASPRS student chapter to attend the 75th annual ASPRS conference, Boltimore, ML and presented a team project on the historical events in the 1970's lead by Penny Wagner, the current president of the UTSA ASPRS chapter, with contributions from Mark Schnur, Beibei Yu, Yang Gao, and Burcu Cicek.
  • January 30, 2009 — LRSG hosted the third MORE science colloquium funded by the Department of Education with supports from the College and the Department. PhD student Newfel Mazari organized it.
  • January 9, 2009 — LRSG graduate students Burcu and Penny on the Vector of UTSA COS news.
  • January 7, 2009 — Summer interns available in NASA/Lunar and Planetary Institute: Lunar Exploration interns and Lunar and Planetary Sciences interns.
  • December 14-19, 2008 — Dr. Xie and LRSG students Y. Gao, B. Yu, and M. Schnur attended and presented five papers at the annual AGU fall meeting in San Francisco, CA.
  • November 21, 2008 — ASPRS UTSA Chapter and LRSG exhibited our geospatial related works to hundreds of San Antonio school kids at the San Antonio GIS Day. Thanks to graduate students Beibei Yu and Newfel Mazari for their time and hard work.
  • November 19, 2008 — Dr. Xie awarded a UTSA Tenure-Track Research Award to study urban heat island phenomenon in four Texas Cities: Houston, Dallas-Ft Worth, San Antonio, and El Paso using remote sensing technology. Congratulations!!
  • November 4, 2008 — Blake Weissling will defense his dissertation on November 12. You are welcome to attend.
  • October 22, 2008 — SPIE international conference on Remote Sensing and Modeling of Ecosystems for Sustainability, Aug 2-6, 2009, at San Diego, CA, is calling for abstracts. Dr. Xie is the program committee member for the conference.
  • October 21, 2008 — First call for abstracts for the third annual MORE student colloquium.
  • October 17, 2008 — Burcu Cicek and Penny Wagner received full travel support to attend OSL-APECS-PYRN workshop IMPETUS 2008 - Techniques in Polar Ocean Observation and Monitoring at St. Petersburg, Russia (Nov 19-22, 2008), a great opportunity for our students to meet polar scientists world wide and discuss cutting edge science and technology issues for polar sea ice. Congratulations!!
  • October 16, 2008 — Mark Schnur will defend his thesis. You are welcome to attend.
  • September 11 2008 - Space Grant Internship opportunity.
  • September 2008 — Dr. Ahmet Tekeli, a scientist from Turkish State Meteorological Services, accepted our postdoc position funded by a NASA project and will join the LRSG within a couple of months. Congratulations!!
  • July 25, 2008 — Our "gap layers" paper published in the GRL, was the editor's choice for the June issue's cover page, and is highlighted by the Environmental research web at UK.
  • July 8-11, 2008 — Steve Ackley attended the SCAR (Scientific Committee on Antarctic Research) meeting at St. Petersburg, Russia and gave 5 presentations.
  • June-July 2008 — PhD student Cicek visited Turkey and Switzerland, and attended three workshops and conferences:
    • June 2-6 — attended the EARSeL (European Association of Remote Sensing Laboratories) conference at Istanbul, Turkey
    • June 29-July 4 — attended ISSI (International Space Science Institute) workshop at Bern, Switzerland and presented a paper "The remote sensing of sea ice during SIMBA07"
    • July 6-10 — attended CCGW (Global Conference of Global Warming) conference at Istanbul, Turkey and presented a paper "Sea ice in climate change from space"
  • June-July 2008 — Dr. Xie visited China for collaborative research, presentation and conference:
    • June 9-15 — at Lanzhou University
    • June 15-18 — at China University of Geoscience Wuhan
    • June 18-21 — at East China Institute of Technology (ECIT); Dr. Xie was appointed and honored as an adjunct professor by the ECIT's president Liu Qingchen (刘庆成)
    • June 30-July 2 — at the 2008 International Workshop on Earth Observation and Remote Sensing Applications Beijing where Dr. Xie chaired a session of Sensors and Systems
  • May 8, 2008 — PhD scholarship and Postdoc positions are available in the LRSG lab.
  • April 27-May 2, 2008 — Dr. Xie attended the NASA Carbon Cycle & Ecosystem Joint Science Workshop and presented (with G. Liu and J. McClelland) a team-resulted poster for the NASA's IDS project (#NNX07AL79G), at University of Maryland Inn and Conference Center.
  • April 23, 2008 — Misti Thueson successfully defended her thesis entitled "Exploring high-albedo event craters in the near-polar permanent ice cap of Mars." Her thesis committee is Dr. Xie (chair), Steve Ackley, and Rupali Datta. Congratulation to Ms. Thueson!
  • April 15-19, 2008 — Wang attended and presented one paper at the AAG Annual meeting, Boston, MA.
  • April 13-18, 2008 — Ackley attended and presented 3 papers at the EGU General Assembly 2008, Vienna, Austria.
  • April 4-9, 2008 — Lewis and Weissling with colleagues from UTSA Mechanical Engineering joined the Barrow, Alaska field experiments for sea ice thickness detection organized by University of Alaska Fairbanks. The UTSA team is supported by the UTSA Collaborative Research Seed Grant Program (PI Nowak, Co-PI Ackley).
  • April 9, 2008 — Our proposal (PI Ackley, Co-PI Xie) entitled "Antarctic sea ice thickness from space: validating estimates from the laser and radar satellite altimeters with ship-based measurements" (2008-2011, ~$600,000) was selected for funding by NASA Cryosphere program. One postdoc and one PhD student will be supported. This is a great news to LRSG. Congratulations!!!
  • March 27, 2008 — Xianwei Wang successfully defended his dissertation. His supervising committee is Drs. Hongjie Xie (chair), Richard French, Hatim Sharif, Kyle Murray, and Jerome Keating. Congratulation to Dr. Wang, the first PhD student graduated from the LRSG!
  • March 14, 2008 — Dr. Xie gave a presentation entitled "Precipitation Mapping: Methods and Accuracy" at the UTSA Environmental Science and Engineering graduate seminar.
  • March 10-14, 2008 — Dr. Xie, Dr. Zeng, and LRSG student Lu attended the 39th LPSC conference, in Houston, Texas and presented 2 papers.
  • February 10-13, 2008 — Ackley was invited to attend the NSF-funded Oden Southern Ocean Workshop at Lejondals Slott, Sweden.
  • February 8, 2008 — The 2nd MORE Science Colloquium was held at the LRSG lab. It was a great success! Xianwei organized and hosted the conference. Congratulations!!
  • January 22, 2008 — Team spells "UTSA" in the snow in UTSA Today.
  • December 10-14, 2007 — Steve Ackley, Dr. Xie, and LRSG students Austin, Penny, Newfel, Beibei, Blake, Xianwei, Burcu, Mike, and Zuxun attended and presented 10 papers in the AGU Fall Meeting in San Francisco, CA. Dr. Xie (with Dr. T. Markus of NASA) chaired a session C23B: Sea Ice IV: Snow on Sea Ice.
  • December 7, 2007 — Burcu Cicek defended her dissertation proposal entitled "Estimation of Antarctic Sea Ice Thickness from Surface and Space Borne Altimetry" and passed. Congratulations!
  • December 2007 — UTSA/LRSG joined the partnership between polar communities of China and the U.S. Congratulations!!
  • November 16, 2007 — ASPRS UTSA Chapter and LRSG exhibited our geospatial related works to hundreds of San Antonio school kids at the San Antonio GIS Day - Student Day. PhD student Burcu Cicek lead the effort with help from Newfel Mazari and Penny Wagner.
  • November 2007 — The SIMBA group came back home safely and successfully from 2-months of field work on the Antarctic sea ice!
  • September 28, 2007 — Dr. Xie gave a presentation entitled "Remote Sensing of Snow and Ice: from Land Surface, to Southern Ocean (Antarctic), and to Mars" at the UTSA Environmental Science and Engineering graduate seminar.
  • September 26, 2007 — ASPRS UTSA Student Chapter established in May 2007 and launched its own website today. UTSA remote sensing and GIS folks have our own organization and website now! Congratulations!
  • September 12, 2007 — Dr. Minqiang Zhu was informed that the National Science Foundation of China (NSFC) approved his proposal entitled "Mars Express/OMEGA surface spectra retrieve methods and mineral detection" for which he started the study in LRSG as a visiting professor, together with Drs. Xie and Guan (a former postdoc in LRSG). Both are collaborators for the 3-year project (2008-2010). Congratulations!
  • September 11, 2007 — Visiting/exchange students Yang Gao and Xiaodong Huang, sponsored by Chinese Fellowship Committee, arrived at UTSA for one or two years of study/research focusing on remote sensing and GIS. Welcome!
  • September 7, 2007 — The 1st and 2nd sets of photos from the Antarctic trip were sent by Penny from Palmer Station.
  • August 21-September 10, 2007 — Graduate student Lisha Zhou from SUNY-Stony Brook visiting LRSG to learn processing NEXRAD precipitation data.
  • August 26-November 3, 2007 — LRSG scientists Penny, Bev, Blake, Mike, and Steve deployed to Antarctic for the SIMBA project, funded by NSF.
  • August 23, 2007 — Anderson, Ackley, and UTSA's Antarctic trip on San Antonio Express News.
  • August 22, 2007 — Anderson, Ackley and UTSA's Antarctic program on KENS5 TV News.
  • August 18, 2007 — The LRSG group held the 3rd annual picnic. Xianwei organized the picnic activity.
  • August 16, 2007 — Ackley, Anderson and LRSG Antarctic program on UTSA Today.
  • August 13-17, 2007 — Dr. Xie attended the CSIG 2007 (Geoinformatics) workshop at the San Diego Supercomp. Center, UCSD, sponsored by NSF.
  • July 26-31, 2007 — Dr. Xie and LRSG students Jordan and Yu attended the MORE science field trip led by Dr. Lance Lambert. It was a great trip!
  • July 26, 2007 — A fall AGU session "snow on sea ice: measurements, processes, and impacts" proposed by Drs. Xie and Markus is accepted. Congratulations!
  • July 9-13, 2007 — Dr. Xie presented a paper in the 7th International Conference on Mars, Pasadena, CA.
  • July 2-13, 2007 — Cicek attended the International Sea-Ice Summer School, Svalbard, Norway.
  • June 27-29, 2007 — Dr. Xie was invited by NASA (via a travel fund) to attend the ICESAT-II workshop in Washington DC.
  • June 18, 2007 — Mike Lewis defended his dissertation proposal and passed. Congratulations!
  • June 13-16, 2007 — Professor Zuji Qiang visited UTSA and gave a series of talks about using satellite thermal infrared anomalies for earthquake predictions. It was great!
  • June 2007 — Dr. Xie awarded a grant from TexasView Remote Sensing Consortium to develop an algorithm for MODIS data processing. Congratulations!
  • June 2007 — Cicek and her Antarctic study cited in "Zooming in on Climate Change" of the Imaging NOTES magazine.
  • May 30, 2007 — LRSG scientists and the ODEN Antarctic trip highlights in the front page and feature article of the UTSA Sombrilla magazine.
  • May 2007 — LRSG (PI Ackley) received a supplemental fund for participating the Antarctic ODEN Expedition in December 2006. Congratulations!
  • May 7-11, 2007 — Wang attended the ASPRS annual meeting in Tampa, FL. He presented one paper and was a moderator for the session Water Resource Mapping.
  • May 3, 2007 — Dr. Xie awarded a two-year grant from Texas Space Grant Consortium's New Investigations Program (TSGC NIP) to study the Martian surface composition and H2O and CO2 cycles. Congratulations!
  • May 2007 — Cicek received a travel award from IEEE IGARSS 07 to present a paper in Barcelona, Spain, in July. Congratulations!
  • May 2007 — Wagner received scholarships from South Texas GSA and George R. Pinkley award for a field camp course in summer. Congratulations!
  • April 6, 2007 — Dr. Xie gave a invited talk "Statistic Evaluation of the Improved NEXRAD Precipitation Estimates Using Rain Gauge Measurements" in the Department of Management Science and Statistics seminar series at UTSA.
  • April 2007 — LRSG (Cicek and Xie) awarded three IKONOS images (value $8,141) from GeoEye Foundation to study Antarctic sea ice and Mt. Erebus volcano. Congratulations!
  • April 2007 - UTSA/LRSG's Antarctic project (PI Ackley) highlighted in the IPY Overview by the National Academy of Sciences.
  • April 2007 — Dr. Xie will give a talk on "Global warming from Antarctic to San Antonio" to the 2007 Certified GO GREEN ExpoWorkshopCinema, May 18-19 at Live Oak Civic Center, San Antonio, TX.
  • April 2007 — Steve Ackley, Dr. Xie, and LRSG student Cicek on TV program talk about global warming from Antarctic to San Antonio (air time 1:30 pm April 15, May 13 and June 3 on Time Warner Cable Education Channel 98).
  • March 28, 2007 — Our inaugural provost lecturer Dr. Jerome Nriagu is on UTSA Today.
  • March 25-30, 2007 — Steve Ackley and LRSG students Saunders, Wagner, Cicek, and Lewis attended the Gordon conference-Polar Marine Science in Ventura, CA and presented 5 papers.
  • March 11-16, 2007 — Dr. Xie, Dr. Zeng and LRSG students Wagner, Thueson, and Yue attended the 38th LPSC in Houston, Texas and presented 6 papers.
  • February 13, 2007 — LRSG scientists on UTSA Today.
  • February 8, 2007 — UTSA researchers examine effects of global warming on Antarctic on national media.
  • February 3, 2007 — LRSG scientists on San Antonio Express News: Earth's Protection is melting away.
  • January 15-18, 2007 — Dr. Xie, Dr. Sharif, and LRSG students Wang, Blake, and Cicek attended and presented papers in the 87th AMS annual meeting in San Antonio, TX. Drs. Sharif and Xie chaired two sections in the meeting.
  • January 14, 2007 — Steve Ackley interviewed by Ms. Ute Kaden's student Megan Hernandez from Homer Hanna HS, Brownsville, TX.
  • January 12, 2007 — ODEN passing through sea ice during the expedition (video 1 and video 2).
  • January 11, 2007 — Turkish women conquer Antarctic on Turkish Daily News. Check out the video when she was shaking a Turkish flag on the fast ice of McMurdo Sound.
  • January 10, 2007 — A series of photos taken during the Antarctic Expedition posted (events and/or time based order) for reviewing. High resolution photos can be requested.
  • January 2007 — A project entitled "Using satellite data and fully coupled regional hydrologic, ecological and atmospheric models to study complex coastal environmental processes" has been approved for funding by NASA IDS Program. Dr. Xie is one of the 6 PIs for the project led by Dr. Zong-Liang Yang at UT Austin. Congratulations!!!
  • December 20, 2006 — A Little Lesson on Antarctic Ice reported from Polartrec by Mr. Allan Miller, a teacher onboard ODEN.
  • December 11-15, 2006 — Steve Ackley, Dr. Zeng, and LRSG students Lewis and Weissling attended and presented 4 papers at the AGU fall meeting at the San Francisco, CA. Ackley served as a co-convener for session "Marine Cryosphere VI: Exploration with AUVs, ROVs, and Other Unmanned Technologies."
  • December 8-30, 2006 — Dr. Xie and Burcu Cicek went to Antarctica funded by a NSF grant (PI Ackley); together with Ute Kaden, a high school teacher at Brownsville, TX, we will do sea ice study.
  • December 2006 — UTSA on NSF media release: Multinational scientific expedition kicks off International Polar Year.
  • November 29, 2006 — Zongyu Yue, a PhD student from China University of Geoscience (Beijing) arrived at our lab for a half year visit to learn remote sensing and its application on Moon and Mars. Welcome!!
  • November 17, 2006 — The first MORE colloquium was successfully held. PhD student Burcu Cicek organized it.
  • November 15, 2006 — LRSG group exhibited our geospatial related works to hundreds of San Antonio school kids at the San Antonio GIS Day-Student Day. PhD student Xianwei Wang lead the LRSG effort.
  • November 13, 2006 — Dr. Xie gave a invited talk entitled "Remote sensing in hydrology: several case studies" at the graduate seminar of TAMUK-CREST center.
  • November 6-10, 2006 — Dr. Xie and LRSG students Cicek and Wang attended and presented two papers at the ASPRS/MAPPS fall meeting in San Antonio, TX. Cicek won second place in student paper competition of ASPRS Mid-South Region. Congratulations!!!
  • November 6, 2006 — EES Department announced the McNutt Scholarship, application due date November 27, 2006.
  • November 2-3, 2006 — Texas Space Grant Consotium annual meeting at SwRI. Dr. Xie presented the works of the LRSG Mars group.
  • October 22-24, 2006 — Dr. Xie, Dr. Zeng, and LRSG student Wagner attended the workshop on Martian Sulfates as Recorders of Atmospheric-Fluid-Rock Interactions. Xie gave a poster presentation.
  • October 10, 2006 — Application (due 02/02/2007) for graduate student (master) scholarship is available at the Center for Water Research.
  • September 16, 2006 — The LRSG group held the 2nd annual picnic as well as a farewell party for Huade and Minqiang's leaving USA. Blake organized the picnic activity.
  • August 21, 2006— Blake Weissling defended his dissertation proposal and passed. Congratulations!!!
  • June-August 2006 — LRSG hosted 3 undergraduate students supported by the MORE Science program to do summer research. They are Melissa Quinones, Penelope Wagner, and Carrie Benson under supervisions of Drsr. Guan, Zhu, and Xie, respectively. All of them are doing a great job.
  • June-August 2006 — LRSG supported a COOP PhD student Chaojun Fan of the Washington State University (under Dr. Dirk Schulze-Makuch's supervision) to work with LRSG researchers on remote sensing on Martian applications.
  • July 31-August 4, 2006 — Cicek attended and gave a talk on the IEEE IGARSS annual meeting, Denver, CO.
  • July 24-26, 2006 — Dr. Xie attended the West Pacific Geophysic Meeting at Beijing, China and Gave a talk about remote sensing application to the Northern Xinjiang, China region.
  • July 23-29, 2006 — Cicek was invited by Dr. Jay Zwally, the project scientist for the NASA's ICESat mission, to visit NASA and discuss the possible collaboration. Dr. Zwally agreed to be on Cicek's dissertation committee.
  • July 16-23, 2006 — Invited by Dr. Tianggang Liang, Dr. Xie visited the College of Pastoral Agriculture Science and Technology at Lanzhou University and gave four lectures and had many discussions on the NSFC project we are working on together and possible new projects and proposals in the future.
  • July 11, 2006 — Dr. Xie gave a presentation to scientists at the National Key Lab of Remote Sensing at Beijing Research Institute of Uranium Geology, Beijing, China, where Dr. Xie studied and worked for about 10 years before coming to the USA. Possible collaboration was discussed.
  • July 5-7, 2006 — Steve Ackley and LRSG students Lewis and Cicek attended and presented 3 papers at the International Workshop on Antarctic Sea Ice Thickness. Ackley severed as a co-chair for this workshop.
  • July 2006 — Dr. Xie meet with Dr. Danping Yang and others at the China University of Geosciences at Beijing (CUGB) and discussed a collaborative project for the support of the Chinese "Moon Exploration Program." CUGB is supporting a PhD student to LRSG for a half year visiting to learn remote sensing application on Mars and Planetary Science.
  • May 23-26, 2006 - LRSG group (Guan, Zhu, and Xie) attended and presented 6 papers at the 2006 AGU Joint Assembly at Baltimore, ML. Xie served as a co-convener for the Precipitation of Remote Sensing session (H23C).
  • May 1-5, 2006 — PhD students Blake and Xianwei attended and presented two papers at the ASPRS Annual Conference at Neno, NV. Blake served as a moderator for the Watershed Monitoring I Session. Xianwei served as a moderator for the Remote Sensing Soil Moisture Measurement session.
  • April 25, 2006 — Ms. Lani Cabico defended her thesis and passed. She will be the first graduated student of LRSG. Congratulations!!!
  • April 14, 2006 — Dr. Xie gave a invited seminar talk entitled "LRSG at UTSA and preliminary research results on remote sensing of vegetation, hydrology, and Mars"" at the TxGISCi and Department of Geography at TSU San Marcos.
  • April 2006 — Steve Ackley joins the EES Department; in particularly, he will work with the LRSG group and will advise graduate students and postdocs. He is a great asset to UTSA and brings 30 years research experiences of Antarctica sea ice. His reputation will lift our research into a brand new level towards Tier 1 research university. Welcome and Congratulations!!!
  • April 2006 — PhD candidate Wang was offered a summer internship by the USGS AmericanView program to work on a project entitled "Student Internships In Earth Observation Forest Monitoring Science" at the GIScCE in Brookings, SD. Congratulations!!!
  • March 23, 2006 — Xianwei Wang defended his dissertation proposal and passed. Congratulations!!!
  • March 13-17, 2006 — Drs. Xie, Zhu, and Guan presented 3 papers at the 37th LPSC meeting in Houston, TX.
  • March 7-11, 2006 — PhD student Xianwei Wang presented a paper at the Annual AAG meeting in Chicago, IL
  • March 2006 — Newfels Mazari offered a CWR graduate research assistantship for 2 years to design and install high dense rain gauge network and calibrate/validate NEXRAD rainfall. Congratulations!!!
  • March 2006 — PhD student Burcu Cicek awarded a travel grant stipend to present two papers at the Annual IEEE International Geoscience and Remote Sensing Symposium in Denver, CO. Congratulations!!!
  • February 23-25, 2006 — Drs. Xie and Zhu attended NEON planning meeting at the Biology Station of the University of Oklahoma.
  • January 23, 2006 — Drs. Xie, Zhu, Guan, Sharif, and LRSG student Wang visited the National Weather Service at New Braunfels. Sharif and Xie gave two presentations of their works on NEXRAD.
  • January 17, 2006 — Dr. Xie gave a presentation of "Remote sensing: present and developing UTSA capabilities" to the USGS office in San Antonio.
  • January 2006 — PhD student Chaojun Fan of Washington State University visited LRSG for 2.5 weeks to learn remote sensing and its Martian applications.
  • December 2005 — CWR Graduate Research Assistantship available.
  • November 17, 2005 — PhD student Burcu Cicek awarded a 18th Global Change Graduate Scholarship to attend the 86th AMS Annual Meeting in Atlanta, GA (1/29-2/2, 2006). Congratulations!!!
  • November 2-3, 2005 — Drs. Xie and Zhu attended the 14th MEPAG meeting at Monrovia, CA. This meeting focused on recent Mars missions and discoveries, and future plan.
  • October 24-28, 2005 — Huade Guan (through John Wilson) presented a paper at the 32nd Conference on Radar Meteorology at Albuquerque, NM.
  • October 23-27, 2005 — Blake Weissling presented a paper at the Pecora 16 Remote Sensing Conference at Sioux Falls, SD.
  • October 10-11, 2005 — Drs. Xie, Guan, and Zhu attended the NEON Region 11 (Texas and Oklahoma) planning meeting at the Aquarena Springs Center of San Marcos, Texas.
  • October 4-6, 2005 — Drs. Xie, Guan, Zhu, and LRSG students Cabico and Wang attended the 20th Biennial Workshop on Remote Sensing for Resource Assessment at Weslaco, Texas. Cabico, Wang, and Xie presented three papers at the workshop.
  • August 2005 — "Heat Island" of San Antonio downtown area detected by MODIS (Aqua) temperature product.
  • August 2005 — Drs. Alyson Ponomarenko (PI) and Hongjie Xie (Co-PI) received a U.S. Department of Education grant titled "Minority Opportunities for Research Experience in Earth Science at the University of Texas at San Antonio (MORE Science at UTSA)." Congratulations!!!
  • August 2005 — Postdoc Huade Guan graduated from New Mexico Tech and visiting professor Dr. Minqiang Zhu from East China Institute of Technology will join LRSG in this fall. Welcome!!!
  • May 2005 — Blake Weissling received a graduate fellowship from Texas Space Grant Consortium. Congratulations!!!
  • April 1-2, 2005 — Three students, Lani Cabico, Selene Fernandez, and Sandra Ytuarte, presented three research papers in the South-Central Section GSA meeting, San Antonio, TX.
  • April 2005 — Dr. Xie received a TexasView Remote Sensing Consortium Research Award. Congratulations!!!
  • March 14-18, 2005 — Selene Fernandez presented "Understanding the Olympus Mons and Valles Marineris using THEMIS imagery" at the 36th LPSC meeting, Houston, TX.
  • March 14-16, 2005 — Kunle Owojori presented "Landsat image-based LULC changes of San Antonio, Texas using advanced atmospheric correction and object-oriented image analysis approaches" in the 5th International Symposium on Remote Sensing of Urban Areas, Tempe, AZ.
  • February 2005 — Postdoc position available.
  • January 9-13, 2005 — Dr. Xie presented "Rainfall climatology of the monsoon season in New Mexcio" in the 85th AMS annual meeting, San Diego, CA.
  • December 2004 — Dr. Xie received a UTSA faculty research award (2005). Congratulations!!!
  • December 13-17, 2004 — Dr. Xie presented "Evaluation of MODIS snow-cover products with constraints from streamflow and SNOTEL data" at the AGU fall meeting, San Francisco, CA.
  • December 8, 2004 — Lani Cabico passed her thesis proposal defense. Congratulation!!!
  • November 2004 — Jayar Griffith got and started his internship at the San Antonio River Authority. Congratulations!!!
  • November 23, 2004 — Dr. Xie presented "Precipitation of proposed Texas hydrological observatory" in the Texas HO working group meeting, Austin, TX.
  • November 10-13, 2004 — Kunle Owojori got the Third Best Graduate Paper at the ASPRS regional conference, Nacogdoches, TX for his oral presentation of "Land cover change associated with the growth of Nacogdoches and Lufkin, Texas from 1984-2002." Congratulations!!!
  • October 8, 2004 — Dr. Xie presented "Remote sensing and its future" in the UTSA Environmental Science and Engineering PhD Program Seminar.
  • September 29, 2004 — Dr. Xie presented "Improving NEXRAD rainfall estimates for flood prediction and water quality modeling" in the SARA water quality focus group meeting, San Antonio, TX.
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