New Views of the Moon: Recent Advances on Lunar Remote Sensing and Applications
A special issue of Remote Sensing (ISSN 2072-4292). This special issue belongs to the section "Satellite Missions for Earth and Planetary Exploration".
Deadline for manuscript submissions: 31 January 2026 | Viewed by 64
Special Issue Editors
Interests: lunar remote sensing; lunar surface mineralogy; radiative transfer model
Interests: lunar geology; lunar remote sensing
Interests: lunar geology; remote sensing
Special Issue Information
Dear Colleagues,
Lunar remote sensing has played a pivotal role in advancing our understanding of the Moon’s geological evolution, surface composition, and interaction with the space environment. Since the 1990s, a series of highly successful missions—particularly those launched in the 21st century—have delivered an abundance of high-resolution datasets. These data have significantly enhanced our understanding of the Moon’s thermal and magmatic history, volatile inventory, and surface processes, while also laying the foundation for future exploration and human activity.
Modern lunar remote sensing encompasses a wide range of techniques, including multispectral and hyperspectral imaging, thermal infrared mapping, radar sounding, gravity field analysis, and topographic profiling. With the continuous development of sensor technologies and data processing methods, the scientific return from remote sensing observations has expanded rapidly. The evolution of analytical methodologies has allowed us to extract increasingly sophisticated information from these datasets, refining our models of lunar formation and surface dynamics.
This Special Issue aims to provide an overview of recent scientific advancements in lunar remote sensing, emphasizing new insights into lunar geology, mineralogy, volatile distribution, surface processes, and the lunar environment. By presenting innovative methodologies and interpretations derived from remotely sensed lunar data, it directly aligns with the journal’s mission to publish scientifically rigorous studies that expand our understanding of planetary surfaces and processes. The contributions will highlight how recent orbital datasets have enhanced our scientific understanding of the Moon, informing future lunar research and exploration.
The scope of this Special Issue includes, but is not limited to, the following topics:
- Detection and mapping of lunar volatiles;
- Mapping of lunar minerals, compositions and glasses;
- Lunar exploration site selection and surface hazard assessment;
- Space weathering, lunar regolith evolution;
- Lunar geology analysis using remote sensing datasets;
- Lunar sample analysis and ground truth calibration;
- Preliminary application of Artificial Intelligence in Lunar remote sensing;
- Innovative concepts for future lunar exploration missions;
- The South Pole–Aitken;
- lunar topography and geomorphology;
- Innovative methods for lunar remote sensing data calibration, processing, and scientific applications.
Dr. Lingzhi Sun
Dr. Yuqi Qian
Dr. Le Qiao
Dr. Honglei Lin
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
- the moon
- lunar volatile
- remote sensing
- spectroscopy
- lunar south pole
- mineralogy
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