The world in transition

Earth is in a constant state of change, and humans often trigger or contribute toward these changes to a significant degree. These include increasing urbanisation, expanding land use for agriculture, the loss of biodiversity, and changes in air quality. Change is also clearly perceptible in the melting of glaciers and the resulting rise in sea level.
As such, monitoring global change and looking for measures that can mitigate these effects are becoming increasingly pressing concerns. DLR’s space research and technology has the unique benefit of extending across all of the necessary infrastructure and areas of research. Earth observation from space is the only technology that makes it possible to perform this kind of monitoring globally, with a high level of spatial and temporal resolution and accuracy, and do so independently of political constraints.
Objective tracking of change processes helps for example to understand the global spatial distribution and evolution of human settlements and to assure sustainable development. DLR’s World Settlement Footprint (WSF) gives an overview into urban structures. Precise monitoring of global change is also needed in order to issue timely warnings or provide an appropriate response to disasters such as oil spills, forest fires, and floods.

Deutsches Zentrum für Luft- und Raumfahrt (DLR)
Manuela Braun · E-Mail manuela.braun@dlr.de