Abstract
Owing to usual logistic hardships related to field-based cryospheric research, remote sensing has played a significant role in understanding the frozen components of the Earth system. Conventional spaceborne or airborne remote sensing platforms have their own merits and limitations. Unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) have emerged as a viable and inexpensive option for studying the cryospheric components at unprecedented spatiotemporal resolutions. UAVs are adaptable to various cryospheric research needs in terms of providing flexibility with data acquisition windows, revisits, data/sensor types (multispectral, hyperspectral, microwave, thermal/night imaging, Light Detection and Ranging (LiDAR), and photogrammetric stereos), viewing angles, flying altitudes, and overlap dimensions. Thus, UAVs have the potential to act as a bridging remote sensing platform between spatially discrete in situ observations and spatially continuous but coarser and costlier spaceborne or conventional airborne remote sensing. In recent years, a number of studies using UAVs for cryospheric research have been published. However, a holistic review discussing the methodological advancements, hardware and software improvements, results, and future prospects of such cryospheric studies is completely missing. In the present scenario of rapidly changing global and regional climate, studying cryospheric changes using UAVs is bound to gain further momentum and future studies will benefit from a balanced review on this topic. Our review covers the most recent applications of UAVs within glaciology, snow, permafrost, and polar research to support the continued development of high-resolution investigations of cryosphere. We also analyze the UAV and sensor hardware, and data acquisition and processing software in terms of popularity for cryospheric applications and revisit the existing UAV flying regulations in cold regions of the world. The recent usage of UAVs outlined in 103 case studies provide expertise that future investigators should base decisions on.
Highlights
“Cryosphere” refers to the frozen component of water in the form of glaciers, snow cover, ice sheets, ice caps, frozen lakes and rivers, sea ice, and frozen ground or permafrost
unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) have been increasingly used as a remote sensing platform for studying cryospheric components such as snow cover, glaciers, ice sheets, permafrost, and other polar targets such as wild life, landforms, peatlands and sea ice [6]
The present review summarizes the recent cryospheric applications of UAVs between 2014 and 2019 that were not covered in any previous review
Summary
“Cryosphere” refers to the frozen component of water in the form of glaciers, snow cover, ice sheets, ice caps, frozen lakes and rivers, sea ice, and frozen ground or permafrost. Owing to high albedo characteristics of snow and ice and their physical interactions with the other components of the Earth system, the cryosphere plays an important role in the global biogeochemical cycles and energy balance This means that any qualitative or quantitative alteration in the spatiotemporal extents or characteristics of the cryosphere has the potential to affect global or regional air circulation patterns, sea and air temperatures, ocean currents, and global sea level. If the glacial lake is spread across just a few tens or hundreds of meters squared, compromising too much on the spatial resolutions is not ideal Such satellite images can prove to be too coarse for studying individual smaller-sized alpine glaciers and snow fields and are subject to extensive cloud cover the majority of the year [2]. To the best of our knowledge, this paper is the first review of applications of UAV technology dedicated to cryospheric research
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