Exhchange with researchers on monitoring the changing Arctic at the SvalbardMonitoring workshop 2025, Longyearbyen

Recently, Arctic researchers from around the world participated in the SvalbardMonitoring workshop, a four-day event organized by the Norwegian Institute for Nature Research (NINA) in Longyearbyen, Svalbard. The workshop focused on Arctic vegetation and biomass research, with a methodological emphasis on remote sensing as a critical technique to acquire environmental data. Sessions covered long-term vegetation dynamics, phenology and vegetation growth, ecosystem modelling, Arctic greening and browning, field-based monitoring systems, links to herbivorous wildlife ecology, and cryosphere-snow-vegetation interactions.

On behalf of a team of co-authors from University of Würzburg, the German Aerospace Center (DLR) and UNIS, I presented new research on the potential of UAV-LiDAR-derived cm-resolution snow depth mapping for analysing snow-ecosystem interactions on Svalbard (https://hdl.handle.net/11250/5276447). My talk included the introduction of a new snow depth product with a spatial resolution of 2.5 cm and high spatial precision, developed and validated by a joint effort of University of Würzburg and UNIS teams at two research sites on Svalbard using a LiDAR-equipped Verticle Take-off and Landing (VTOL) UAV.

The workshop allowed exchange on the newest research and developments in the field among participants from various research backgrounds and home institutions, including Aarhus University, Alaska Pacific University, Alfred Wegener Institute (AWI), Austrian Polar Research Institute, Cambridge University, Centre for Ecological Research and Forestry Applications (CREAF), NINA, NORCE, Norwegian Polar Institute, Sheffield University, University Centre in Svalbard (UNIS), University of Eastern Finland, University of Iceland, University of Lapland, University of North Arizona, University of Oslo, University of Tromsø, University of Virginia and University of Würzburg.

The event was a great opportunity to meet people with similar interests from diverse scientific backgrounds. I am thankful to have been invited and got to join the exchange.

A similar version of this blog post has been originally published at remote-sensing.org, the blog of the Earth Observation Research Cluster (EORC) at University of Würzburg.