Certificates

Certificate Program in Geohydrology

Students completing the master's or doctoral degree requirements of the School may be awarded a Multidisciplinary Geohydrology Certificate if their program of study satisfies the requirements of the Multidisciplinary Geohydrology program. Additional details can be found in this catalog under Multidisciplinary Certificate Programs in Engineering.

Certificate Program In Remote Sensing

Remote sensing refers to a means of investigating the properties of a target using measurements made at some distance from the target. Applications range from astronomy and environmental applications to medical radiography and automotive collision avoidance radars, as well as security-enhancing sensors. In the last three decades, sensing of the Earth and its atmosphere has increased very substantially because of climate change and global pollution concerns and because of the need for measurements to support the increasingly sophisticated weather and earthquake forecasting and oil and gas surveying capabilities.

Students completing the master's or doctoral degree requirements of the Schools listed below may be awarded a Remote Sensing Certificate. The primary administration of the certificate is through Dr. Irina Sokolik of the School of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences. Departmental contacts are listed below:

Aerospace Engineering: Dr. Robert Braun
Electrical and Computer Engineering: Dr. Manos Tentzeris
Earth and Atmospheric Sciences: Dr. Irina Sokolik
Civil and Environmental Engineering: Dr. Michael Bergin
Chemistry and Biochemistry: Dr. Thomas Orlando
City Planning: Dr. Steven French

The courses that would be used to satisfy the requirements of this certificate have been divided into two areas: First, a group of core courses that cover both fundamentals and applications of remote sensing; second, elective courses that cover a range of courses that cover fundamental physics, data analysis methods, and application areas. A total of 12 credit hours are required to obtain the certificate, including at least two core courses. Nine of the hours must be at the 6000 level or above.

Area 1: Core Courses

CP 6531: Introduction to Remote Sensing - Introduces students to the collection and use of satellite imagery and other remote sensing data

EAS 4430: Remote Sensing and Data Analysis - Introduction to passive environmental remote sensing of the atmosphere and the Earth. Laboratory examples of data and image analysis for remote sensing applications

EAS 4460: Satellite and Radar Meteorology - Interpretation of satellite and radar data for meteorological forecasting based on understanding radiative transfer and the resulting strengths and limitations of the imagery

EAS 6145: Remote Sensing of the Atmosphere and Oceans - Provides foundation for understanding the physical principles of remote sensing and its applications to the study of atmospheric gases, clouds, and ocean surfaces

Area 2: Electives

AE 6353: Orbital Mechanics - historical background and equations of motion, two-body orbital mechanics, orbit determination and prediction, orbital maneuvers, Earth remote sensing and reconnaissance orbits, lunar and interplanetary trajectories and orbital rendezvous. AE 6353 is a pre-requisite for AE 6354.

AE 6354: Advanced Orbital Mechanics - Advanced concepts in orbital mechanics including orbital perturbations, rendezvous, N-body effects, non-spherical gravitational harmonics, and low-thrust maneuvers

CEE 6222: Hydrometeorology - Estimation of hydrologic variables from on-site and remote sensors, operational hydrologic models, parameter estimation, and operational forecasting

CEE 6462: Signals and Inverse Problems in Civil Engineering - Addresses civil engineering signals and systems, discrete time and frequency domain operations, nonlinear and nonstationary systems, inverse problems, matrix-based and other solutions, tomography, and civil engineering examples

CEE 6483: Geotechnical Image and Spatial Analysis - Presentation of techniques for spatial and image processing and analysis of subsurface data at micro and macro scales

CP 6521: Advanced Geographic Information Systems - Provides students with advanced spatial analysis techniques including network analysis, three-dimensional surface modeling, and GIS applications

EAS 4510: Exploration Geophysics - Introduces methods of exploration geophysics, including refraction and reflection seismology, resistivity, gravity, magnetics, and ground penetrating radar, including laboratory work and introduction to operation of field equipment

EAS 4520: Seismic Methods in Exploration Geophysics - A study of seismic reflection exploration methods and theory, with examples taken from oil industry exploration and production and near-surface environmental imaging

EAS 6134: Inverse Methods and Time Series Analysis in EAS - Theory of remotely-sensed data acquisition, time series analysis, and discrete inverse theory, with applications in the Earth and atmospheric sciences

EAS 8803: Special Topics - May be taught as Atmospheric Radiative Transfer. This course provides a foundation for understanding the theoretical and computer modeling principles of radiative transfer in planetary atmospheres

EAS 8803: Special Topics - May be taught as Optical Techniques in Atmospheric Sensing. Discusses light propagation and scattering, and instrumentation used to make remote measurements in the atmosphere, including a description of infrared atmospheric spectra

ECE 6272: Fundamentals of Radar Signal Processing - Signal modeling, including radar cross section, multipath, and clutter, properties of the ambiguity function and coded waveforms, and algorithms for Doppler processing, detection, and radar imaging

ECE 6780: Medical Image Processing - A study of methods for enhancing, analyzing, interpreting, and visualizing information from two- and three-dimensional data obtained from a variety of medical imaging modalities

ECE 7370: Antennas and Wave Propagation in Matter - Basic methods for characterizing the electromagnetic properties of common materials (geophysical, biological, etc.) and techniques for analyzing antennas and wave propagation in these materials

Courses in development:

AE/EAS 4XXX: Designing a UAV for Remote Sensing Applications - This course is currently being planned and EAS recently received a NASA grant to provide education in this subject area.

EAS 6XXX: Earth Science/Geological Applications of Remote Sensing - A new faculty memberin EAS geodetic remote sensing will be creating this course. It probably will include Global Positioning System (GPS) applications

Other new courses on remote sensing may qualify as electives for this certificate with approval by the Remote Sensing Certificate, Dr. Irina Sokolik.