Skip to main content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Core Science Systems Mission Area

USGS CSS serves as the primary national civilian mapping agency, including topographic and geologic mapping for Federal and State requirements, national geospatial coordination, satellite operations and remote sensing. Our products and data are necessary to understand, monitor, and detect changes that affect the Nation’s natural and agricultural resources, the economy, public safety, and security.

News

Landsat 7 Celebrates Silver Anniversary

Landsat 7 Celebrates Silver Anniversary

Media Alert: USGS field crews to study avalanche prone regions using airborne techniques near Durango

Media Alert: USGS field crews to study avalanche prone regions using airborne techniques near Durango

Calibration and Validation Quarterly Reports Now Include Landsat 9 Analysis

Calibration and Validation Quarterly Reports Now Include Landsat 9 Analysis

Publications

Landsat Next

Landsat Next's launch in the early 2030s will ensure continuity of the longest space-based record of Earth’s land surfaces. The mission will substantially increase the breadth and quality of Earth observation data available to scientists, land managers, and others responsible for managing Earth's natural resources. Landsat Next’s constellation of three satellites will carry sensors that improve bo

Monitoring polar ice change in the twilight zone

Landsat’s new extended data collection program is mapping Arctic and Antarctic regions year-round, even in polar twilight.
Authors
Theodore A. Scambos, Christopher Shuman, Mark Fahnestock, Tasha Snow, Christopher J. Crawford

Remote sensing-based 3D assessment of landslides: A review of the data, methods, and applications

Remote sensing (RS) techniques are essential for studying hazardous landslide events because they capture information and monitor sites at scale. They enable analyzing causes and impacts of ongoing events for disaster management. There has been a plethora of work in the literature mostly discussing (1) applications to detect, monitor, and predict landslides using various instruments and image anal
Authors
Hessah Albanwan, Rongjun Qin, Jung-Kuan (Ernie) Liu

Science

Eyes on Earth Episode 116 – Landsat Images the Twilight Zone

A new Landsat project is adding more images of polar regions so that rapid changes happening there can be mapped in more detail.
link

Eyes on Earth Episode 116 – Landsat Images the Twilight Zone

A new Landsat project is adding more images of polar regions so that rapid changes happening there can be mapped in more detail.
Learn More
link

Eyes on Earth Episode 115 – EROS Women in Science

To celebrate Women’s History Month, we gathered some of the women who have made a difference in science at EROS.
Learn More

Eyes on Earth Episode 114 – The Color of Water with Landsat

We’re going to find out how researchers took an old data technique in freshwater science—physically sampling lake water—and reinvented it using satellite technology to study water quality in lakes across the U.S.
link

Eyes on Earth Episode 114 – The Color of Water with Landsat

We’re going to find out how researchers took an old data technique in freshwater science—physically sampling lake water—and reinvented it using satellite technology to study water quality in lakes across the U.S.
Learn More