Remote sensing has the potential to monitor spatial variation in water quality over large areas. While ocean colour work has developed analytical bio-optical water quality retrieval algorithms for medium spatial resolution platforms, remote sensing of lake water is often limited to high spatial resolution satellites such as Landsat, which have limited spectral resolution. This thesis presents the results of an investigation into satellite monitoring of lake water quality. The aim of this investigation was to ascertain the feasibility of estimating water quality and its spatial distribution using Landsat 7 ETM+ imagery combined with in situ data from Rotorua and Waikato lakes. For the comparatively deep Rotorua lakes, r² values of 0.91 (January 2002) and 0.83 (March 2002) were found between in situ chlorophyll (chl) a and the Band1/Band3 ratio. This technique proved useful for analysing the spatial distribution of phytoplankton, especially in lakes Rotoiti and Rotoehu. For the more bio-optically complex shallow lakes of the Waikato, a linear spectral unmixing (LSU) approach was investigated where the water surface reflectance spectrum is defined by the contribution from pure pixels or endmembers. The model estimates the percentage of the endmember within the pixel, which is then used in a final regression with in situ data to map water quality in all pixels. This approach was used to estimate the concentration of chl a (r² = 0.84). Total suspended solid (TSS) concentration was mapped using the traditional Band 3 regression with in situ data, which combined atmospherically corrected reflectance for both images into a single relationship (r² = 0.98). The time difference between in situ data collection and satellite data capture is a potential source of error. Other potential sources of error include sample location accuracy, the influence of dissolved organic matter, and masking of chl a signatures by high concentrations of TSS. The results from this investigation suggest that remote sensing of water quality provides meaningful and useful information with a range of applications and could provide information on temporal spatial variability in water quality.

Bibliography: leaves 103-113. Uses GIS to map the pattern of widespread transmission, commercial sex workers, poverty prevalence, illiteracy rate, population displacement and other social indicators to show the vulnerability of the region's population; and to demonstrate that there is no single point of radiation of HIV/AIDS in the sub region. Discusses mitigation and prevention strategies and proposes the use of GIS be incorporated in the fight against HIV/AIDS in sub Saharan Africa.

"August 2001." Includes bibliographical references (leaves 77-80). Examines the susceptibility of existing signal processing methods to errors and identifies other possible causes of depth error not accounted for by existing signal processing methods, by analysis of the detected laser return waveform data. Methods to improve depth accuracy are investigated.

The proto-histories of Viet Nam, Cambodia, Laos, and Thailand previously have been considered in isolation, and have been written predominantly by European researchers. This thesis shows that the history of the Hindu religions, adopted by at least the ruling classes in Southeast Asian countries, had been developed far earlier than previous researchers had acknowledged. By taking a regional view, by considering the religion upon which the ‘Indianisation’ process rested, by using Geographic Information Systems and by not pre-judging possible outcomes, this thesis shows that the ‘Brahmanic’ temples of Southeast Asia were originally established to a pattern which represented the Brahmanic priests’ views of their place in both space and time, which in turn related to the greater astronomical cosmos as well as to their inner cosmos. This thesis demonstrates a need for the re-consideration of the proto-history of Southeast Asia, in particular that of Viet Nam, to better reflect the basis on which the ‘Indianisation’ process was adopted by the indigenous peoples and to better collate the data from the various parts of the central to south Vietnamese coast before providing an alternative meta-narrative to that which has been accepted for over 100 years by much of the archaeological community. / Doctor of Philosophhy (PhD)

Extensive brackishwater aquaculture, which is a dominant land-based aquaculture system in Indonesia, has experienced variable success in most farming locations in the country due to poor understanding of spatial assessment of environmental factors and rudimentary site selection criteria. Despite tremendous potential, the application of GIS and remote sensing in spatial assessment has tended to focus on Boolean (Crisp) logic that is often unable to effectively handle the complexity and spatial variability of key environmental factors for the development of aquaculture. This study explored the possibility of integrating fuzzy logic techniques into GIS and remote sensing technology to generate more robust mapping protocols in aquaculture, compensating for the disadvantages of the Crisp method. Two models were developed in two different provinces in Indonesia to spatially assess soil and hydrological constraints on extensive brackishwater aquaculture. The soil assessment focussed on acid sulfate soils (ASS) and sandy-textured sediments in Aceh, and the hydrological study focused on investigating important wave parameters that influence the suitability of coastal areas for siting extensive pond units in South Sulawesi. The study showed that fuzzy-based classification methods, integrated into the image analysis, was highly effective in identifying existing and potential pond areas for extensive brackishwater aquaculture compared to the best result of the commonly used Crisp method. By addition of one or more key environmental variables of ASS into the fuzzy-classified existing and potential ponds areas, a very robust predictive tool to identify potential ponds areas affected by ASS in Kembang Tanjung, Aceh was developed. A more detailed assessment of ASS developed in this study also successfully highlighted the severity of sandy-soils and identified them as another key soil variable that has and will severely impact on pond productivity. The second model developed by the study enables fuzzy logic to be integrated into GIS to predict the possible areas impacted by moderate to high energy wave conditions and possible ways of minimising their direct and indirect impacts. The models developed in this study were shown to work well in both study sites and can be applied elsewhere. The mapping outputs are easy to interpret even by stakeholders with no prior training in map reading. Overall, the models have the potential to reduce planning errors and to improve decision making in aquaculture provided that quality data sources are used.

At no point in history have we demanded so much from our agricultural land whilst simultaneously leaving so little room for management error. Of the many possible environmental impacts from agriculture, soil and water salinisation has some of the most long-lived and deleterious effects. Despite its importance, however, land managers are often unable to make informed decisions of how to manage the risk of salinisation due to a lack of data. Furthermore, there remains no universally agreed method for salinity risk mapping. This thesis addresses these issues by investigating new methods for producing high-resolution predictions of soil salinity, soil physical properties and groundwater depth using a variety of traditional and emerging ancillary data sources. The results show that the methodologies produce accurate predictions yielding natural resource information at a scale and resolution not previously possible. Further to this, a new methodology using fuzzy logic is developed that exploits this information to produce high-resolution salinity risk maps designed to aid both agricultural and natural resource management decisions. The methodology developed represents a new and effective way of presenting salinity risk and has numerous advantages over conventional risk models. The incorporation of fuzzy logic provides a meaningful continuum of salinity risk and allows for the incorporation of uncertainty. The method also allows salinity risk to be calculated relative to any vegetation community and shows where the risk is coming from (root-zone or groundwater) allowing more appropriate management decisions to be made. The development of this methodology takes us a step closer to closing what some have called our greatest gap in agricultural knowledge. That is, our ability to manage the salinity risk at the subcatchment scale.

The research contained within this thesis was directed at examining the spectral properties of regolith-dominated terrains using airborne and proximal hyperspectral instruments. The focus of the investigation was to identify the mineralogy of the regolith and determine if surficial materials were indicative of the underlying bedrock in the regolithdominated terrain of the eastern Olary Domain, South Australia. The research area was constrained to a 250 km2 area around the Cu-Au mineralisation of the White Dam Prosect. Integrated remote sensing, using airborne hyperspectral datasets (HyMap), Landsat imagery and gamma-ray spectroscopy data, was performed to map regolith-landforms and extract information on surficial materials. Detailed calibration of the HyMap dataset, using a modified model-based/empirical line calibration technique, was required prior to information extraction. The White Dam area was able to be divided into: alluvial regolith-dominated; in situ regolith-dominated; and bedrock-dominated terrains, based on mineralogical interpretations of the regolith, using the remotely sensed hyperspectral data. Alluvial regions were characterised by large abundances of vegetation and soils with a hematite-rich mineralogy. Highly weathered areas of in situ material were discriminated by the presence of goethite and kaolinite of various crystallinities, whereas the bedrock-dominated regions displayed white mica-/muscovite-rich mineralogy. Areas flanking bedrock exposures commonly consisted of shallow muscovite-rich soils containing regolith carbonate accumulations. Traditional mineral mapping processes were performed on the HyMap data and were able to extract endmembers of regolith and other surficial materials. The Mixture Tuned Matched Filter un-mixing process was successful at classifying regolith materials and minerals. Spectral indices performed on masked data were effective at identifying the key regolith mineralogical features of the HyMap imagery and proved less time consuming than un-mixing processes. Processed HyMap imagery was able to identify weathering halos, highlighted in mineralogical changes, around bedrock exposures. Proximal spectral measurements and XRD analyses of samples collected from the White Dam Prospect were used to create detailed mineralogical dispersion maps of the surface and costean sections. Regolith materials of the logged sections were found to correlate with the spectrally-derived mineral dispersion profiles. The HyLogger drill core scanning instrument was used to examine the mineralogy of the fresh bedrock, which contrasted with the weathering-derived near-surface regolith materials. The overall outcomes of the thesis showed that hyperspectral techniques were useful for charactering the mineralogy of surficial materials and mapping regolith-landforms. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--School of Earth & Environmental Sciences, 2004.

One computer disk in pocket inside back cover. / System requirements for accompanying computer disk: Macintosh computer. / Bibliography: leaves 148-160. / xii, 161 leaves : ill. (some col.) ; 30 cm. + 1 computer disk (3.5 in. DD) / Title page, contents and abstract only. The complete thesis in print form is available from the University Library. / This thesis presents two new families of classification algorithms for pixel classification based on multi-spectral texture. The research demonstrates that algorithms making use of multispectral texture can be constructed that produce better classifications than standard algorithms at comparable computational cost. / Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Adelaide, Dept. of Electrical and Electronic Engineering, 1994?

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Georgia State University, 2007. / Title from file title page. Hassan Babaie, committee chair; Pamela Burnley, Timothy La Tour, Zhi Young Yin, committee members. Electronic text (143 p. : ill. (some col.), maps (some col.)) : digital, PDF file. Description based on contents viewed Dec. 11, 2007. Includes bibliographical references (p. 138-143).

Thesis (Ph.D.)--Rochester Institute of Technology, 2007. / Typescript. Includes bibliographical references (p. [166]-171).