Zhuosen Wang

TL;DR: In this article, the authors outline the historical development of night-time optical sensors up to the current state-of-the-art sensors, highlight various applications of night light data, discuss the special challenges associated with remote sensing of night lights with a focus on the limitations of current sensors, and provide an outlook for the future of remote sensing.

TL;DR: The Black Marble nighttime lights product suite (VNP46) is available at 500m resolution since January 2012 with data from the VISible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite (VIIRS) Day/Night Band (DNB) onboard the Suomi National Polar-orbiting Platform (SNPP) as discussed by the authors, which utilizes all high-quality, cloud-free, atmospheric-, terrain-, vegetation-, snow-, lunar-, and stray light-corrected radiances to estimate daily nighttime lights (NTL) and other intrinsic surface optical properties.

TL;DR: In this article, the authors assess the moderate-resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) BRDF/albedo 8 day standard product and products from the daily Direct Broadcast (DB) algorithm, and show that these products agree well with ground-based albedo measurements during the more difficult periods of vegetation dormancy and snow cover.

TL;DR: A ground-based, upward-scanning, near-infrared lidar, the Echidna® validation instrument (EVI), built by CSIRO Australia, retrieves forest stand structural parameters, including mean diameter at breast height (DBH), stem count density (stems/area), basal area, and above-ground woody biomass with very good accuracy in six New England hardwood and conifer forest stands as discussed by the authors.

TL;DR: It is concluded that, for MODIS data product continuity and earth system science, an enhanced suite of land and cryosphere products and associated data system capabilities are needed beyond the EDRs currently available from the VIIRS.