Remote-sensing technology in mapping socio-economic divergence of Europe

Abstract

Marine and ocean coasts traditionally act as natural growth poles for humankind. Recent studies conducted by scholars from both natural and social sciences suggest that coastal zones accumulate population, agglomerate industries, attract entrepreneurs, and pull investments. The coastalisation effect remains one of the defining factors of regional development around the globe and is projected to strengthen over the next quarter century. Deepening socio-economic inequality and polarisation between countries and regions despite efforts taken with convergence policies put the “marine factor” on the research agenda. The study contains a comparative evaluation of coastalisation processes across the regions of Europe using remote-sensing technology and statistical multivariate analysis for testing the correlation level of results. The research is based on a dataset for 413 regions of Europe featuring indicators for population density and Gross Regional Product (GRP) in Purchasing Power Parity (PPP) per sq. km. The regions are grouped into clusters depending on their socio-economic indicators and the intensity of nocturnal illumination. The results suggest that coastal and inland region types evenly distribute between clusters, with an average of 40% coastal. Observations of nocturnal illumination clearly indicate an extensive anthropogenic impact on European coasts, both northern and southern. However, their overall luminosity is inferior to inland territories. The study concludes with four patterns derived from a combined methodology of socio-economic indicators and remote-sensing of night-time lighting.

Research on the spatiotemporal distribution and evolution of remote sensing: A data-driven analysis

“…Articles from these countries mostly focused on society, the environment, and energy. To some extent, this indicates that the economic level plays a vital role in scientific input in remote sensing (Li et al, 2016;Lukac et al, 2016;Mikhaylov et al, 2021). Furthermore, for countries/regions with large populations, especially emerging developing countries/regions, new methods based on remote sensing technologies have been sought to solve social problems (such as traffic congestion, environmental pollution, etc.)…”

“…In Asia, there were nations with advanced academic institutions, talented scientific researchers, and large research work output as well as nations with unfavorable research conditions, few scientific researchers, and small study output (Klein et al, 2014;de Beurs et al, 2015;Vadrevu et al, 2019). Thus, the gap in research work output in Asia was larger than that in Europe (Goga et al, 2019;Chen et al, 2020;Mikhaylov et al, 2021). Moreover, the continental gap in Africa has obviously narrowed due to the increasing investment in scientific research in the current decade (Khechba et al, 2021;Mngadi et al, 2022;Sebola, 2022).…”

“…Over the past decades, some countries/regions have been in leading positions in remote sensing-related research, and their research results have influenced the development trend of the industry (Kussul et al, 2017;Mikhaylov et al, 2021). Some countries/regions have come to the forefront and have become a new force in remote sensing-related research and are expanding their field.…”

An evaluation of urbanisation processes in suburban zones using land-cover data and fuzzy set theory

“…Suburbanisation increases public spending on transport, infrastructure and public institutions (Cieślak & Szuniewicz, 2015). These processes lead to changes not only in land cover, but also in the organisation and management of space, and they pose an immense challenge for the authorities of the adjacent rural municipalities that are usually most affected by suburbanisation (Rietkerk & van de Koppel, 2008;Butt et al, 2015;Mikhaylov, et al ,2021). An analysis of the rate of the above processes is an important element of spatial management, which makes it possible to prepare for successive stages of suburbanisation (Barros et al, 2018).…”