Underwater Remote Sensing: Status, New Challenges and Opportunities
A special issue of Remote Sensing (ISSN 2072-4292). This special issue belongs to the section "Environmental Remote Sensing".
Deadline for manuscript submissions: 30 November 2025
Special Issue Editors
Interests: optical methods of seafloor mapping;blending techniques for construction of photomosaics from imagery acquired underwater; seafloor structure reconstruction from multiple views;probabilistic reconstruction of color in underwater imagery;
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Interests: Marine Remote Sensing; habitat mapping; Target Detection; seabed classification; swath sonar; marine geology; multibeam echosounder; sidescan sonar; geophysics; GIS; geostatistics
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Special Issue Information
Approximately 70 percent of the oceans of Earth remain unexplored to modern standards. However, gathering information about seafloor, vegetation, underwater habitats, mineral deposits, etc., is crucial. Some experts consider the wealth of natural resources hidden beneath the water's surface to exceed that of land-based resources, in part due to the depletion of known resources. Therefore, underwater remote sensing must be performed by all countries that claim ownership of parts of the ocean. While traditional acoustic sensing techniques are predominantly utilized in underwater exploration, optical sensing methods are currently gaining popularity due to their exceptionally wide range of spatial and spectral resolutions: from submillimeter (remotely operated or autonomous underwater vehicles) to several meters (e.g., Pixxel's Fireflies with a 5-meter resolution and ~150 spectral bands, Hyperion with 220 bands, etc.). Some satellites, such as WorldView, provide images with a very high spatial resolution (~30 cm) but only possess a few broad spectral bands. It is therefore unclear whether these satellites could be utilized in seafloor classification.
Lidar occupies an intermediate niche in underwater remote sensing. It is a mature technology with a high spatial resolution (several measurements per square meter), but the recorded data require careful processing. In addition, high deployment costs reduce the applicative potential of airborne lidar in some parts of the world.
Prof. Dr. Yuri Rzhanov
Dr. Elias Fakiris
Guest Editors
Manuscript Submission Information
Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.
Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Remote Sensing is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.
Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2700 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.
Keywords
- multibeam sonar
- synthetic aperture sonar
- airborne lidar
- underwater vehicles
- hyperspectral satellites
- satellite-derived bathymetry
- satellite-based bathymetric measurements.
Benefits of Publishing in a Special Issue
- Ease of navigation: Grouping papers by topic helps scholars navigate broad scope journals more efficiently.
- Greater discoverability: Special Issues support the reach and impact of scientific research. Articles in Special Issues are more discoverable and cited more frequently.
- Expansion of research network: Special Issues facilitate connections among authors, fostering scientific collaborations.
- External promotion: Articles in Special Issues are often promoted through the journal's social media, increasing their visibility.
- Reprint: MDPI Books provides the opportunity to republish successful Special Issues in book format, both online and in print.
Further information on MDPI's Special Issue policies can be found here.
