This article provides an overview of some of the recent research in ecological informatics involving remote sensing and GIS. Attention focuses on a selected range of issues including topics such as the nature of remote sensing data sets, issues of accuracy and uncertainty, data visualization and sharing activities as well as developments in aspects of ecological modeling research. It is shown that considerable advances have been made over recent years and foundations for future research established.
BackgroundGeotechnology has been couched as one of the three "mega-technologies" of the 21 st century, along with nanotechnology and biotechnology (Gewin, 2004). On the cusp of the second decade of the 21 st century it is evident that recent developments in the geotechnologies of Geographic Information Science (GIS) and remote sensing have had a substantial impact on ecological research, providing spatial data and associated information to enable the further understanding of ecological systems (Rundell et al., 2009). In a digital society there is sometimes an expectation that information is just a click away and this may apply to spatial information in the domain of ecological informatics. Indeed, it has been in the last five years that developments in and relating to the fields of GIS and remote sensing, such as those seen in internet technologies (e.g., Web 2.0; high performance communication networks; Brunt et al., 2007), sensing technology (e.g., quantum well infrared photodetectors; Krabach, 2000), data standards and interoperability (e.g., OGC® KML 2.2) and spatially explicit modeling (e.g., Osborne et al., 2007), have resulted in the revelation of previously unobservable phenomena and posing of what might be termed second generation of ecological questions. During this time we have also seen more support for the open exchange of data and software and infrastructure for location based services. This paper serves as a review of some of the recent developments in GIS and remote sensing that have been or promises to be of benefit to ecological informatics. The subjects addressed are necessarily selective and limited in scope, drawing on topics of interest to us and, we hope, to you.
