This award seeks students from all academic levels to submit a full paper in AAG that advance remote sensing. Research must have been completed entirely by the applicant. While papers may include co-authors, the applicant must be primarily responsible for the research presented. Students selected as finalists will be placed in a special competition session at the AAG Annual Meeting. First, second, and third place awards will be determined immediately following the competition sessions and awarded at the Awards Luncheon. Cash prizes are provided to the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place finishers!
2025 RSSG Student Honors Paper Competition Winners
1st place: Wenxiu Teng, University of Massachusetts Amherst, Towards High Spatial-Resolution Mapping of Suspended Particulate Matter in Global Coastal Waters Using Satellite Observations
2nd place: Yin Liu, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, A novel harvest phenology Index (HPI) for corn and soybean harvesting date mapping using Landsat and Sentinel-2 imagery on Google Earth Engine
3rd place: Hyunho Lee, Arizona State University, Spatially Masked Adaptive Gated Network for Enhanced SAR-based Flood Mapping with Incomplete Multispectral Data
Honorable Mention: Evelyn Kent, Macalester College, Mapping Forest Types and Above-ground Biomass in a Fragmented, Human-impacted Landscape of Coastal Ecuador
2024 RSSG Student Honors Paper Competition Winners
1st place: Suiyuan Wang, The State University of New York at Buffalo, Continuous monitoring of high spatial and temporal resolution impervious surfaces based on PlanetScope time series
1st place: Zhijie Zhou, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, CropSight: towards a national-scale operational framework for object-based crop type ground truth retrieval using street view and PlanetScope satellite imagery
2nd place: Jing Ling, The University of Hong Kong, Synergizing radar and optical data for accurate urban impervious surface mapping in cloud prone areas
3rd place: Ruilin Chen, Beijing Normal University, Mapping successional stages of biological soil crusts at 3-m resolution through event-induced spectral response: A case study in the Gurbantunggut Desert, China
2023 RSSG Student Honors Paper Competition Winners
1st place: Zherong Wu, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Deep learning of InSAR data for deciphering millimeter-level land subsidence bowls in deltaic metropolitan areas
2nd place: Krista West, San Diego State University/University of California, Landsat spectral mixture analysis for mapping herbaceous fractional cover in wildfire-prone shrublands of San Diego County, California, USA
3rd place: Tianci Guo, University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign, Towards Scalable Field-level Crop Yield Estimation through Integration of Crop Model and Deep Learning
3rd place: Shuheng Zhao, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Spatial-Spectral Interactive Restoration Loop: A Heterogeneity-robust Hyperspectral Image Denoising Framework
2022 RSSG Student Honors Paper Competition Winners
1st place: Xiaoyue Tan, Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Quantitative assessment of the impact of 3-D landscape on the angular effect of nighttime light remote sensing
2nd place: Chishan Zhang, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, County-level soybean yield estimation based on Bayesian-CNN incorporating phenology dynamic
3rd place: Blair Mirka, University of New Mexico, Evaluation of thermal infrared imaging from uninhabited aerial vehicles for arboreal wildlife surveillance
3rd place: Yunze Zang, Beijing Normal University, Chinese rapeseed mapping coupling flower index and one-class classification
2021 RSSG Student Competition Hornor Winners
1st place: Qi Dong, Beijing Normal University, Correction of area estimates derived from subpixel mapping: a two-term method (TTM)
2nd place: Rowan Converse, University of New Mexico, Assessing drought vegetation dynamics at the landscape scale in semiarid grass- and shrubland using MESMA
3rd place: Yilun Zhao, University of Illinois – Urbana Champaign, Monitoring phenology of deciduous forest community and individuals with multiple satellites
3rd place: Yuean Qiu, Beijing Normal University, A Spatiotemporal fusion method to Simultaneously generate Full-length normalized difference vegetation Index Time series
2020 RSSG Student Honors Paper Competition Winners
1st place: Zijun Yang, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, A robust hybrid deep learning modeling framework for spatiotemporal image fusion
2nd place: Phuong Dao, University of Toronto, Improving hyperspectral image segmentation by applying inverse noise weighting and outlier removal for optimal scale selection
3rd place: Ying Lu, University at Buffalo, Automatic training sample collection method for timely large-scale mangrove mapping
3rd place: Jie Dai, San Diego State University, Mapping understory invasive plant species with field and remotely sensed data in Chitwan, Nepal
2019 RSSG Student Honors Paper Competition Winners
1st place: Qiming Zheng, Indian State University and Zhejiang University, Developing a new cross-sensor calibration model for DMSP-OLS and Suomi-NPP VIIRS night-light imageries
2nd place: Ye Tian, University of Georgia, Analysis of Spatial and Seasonal Distributions of Air Pollutants by Incorporating Urban Morphological Characteristics
3rd place: Wenting Cao, Zhejiang University; Iowa State University, Mapping changes in coastlines and tidal flats in developing islands using the full time series of Landsat images
2018 RSSG Student Honors Paper Competition Winners
1st place: Sory I. Toure, San Diego State University; Integrating multi-spatial resolution data and object-based image analysis to examine land use/cover change: A proof of concept for urban land change in the developing world.
2nd place: Xiao Huang, University of South Carolina; A flooding probability reconstruction approach by enhancing near real-time imagery with real-time gauge and tweets.
3rd place: Shengyuan Zou, State University of New York at Buffalo; Detecting vacant house at individual level with remote sensing.
2017 RSSG Student Honors Paper Competition Winners
1st place: Su Ye, Clark University; Monitoring Tropical Tree Crop Plantation Expansion Using Landsat Time Series and a Shapelet-based Approach.
2nd place: Jing Li, UMass, Amherst; Estimating algal biomass in a shallow eutrophic lake using a look-up- table and spectrum-matching approach.
3rd place: Dameng Yin, University of Buffalo; Individual Mangrove Crown Delineation using UAV-LiDAR Data: Possibilities and Difficulties
2016 RSSG Student Honors Paper Competition Winners
1st place: Wenjie Ji, University at Buffalo; Phenology-guided saltcedar (Tamarix spp.) mapping using Landsat TM images in western U.S.
2nd place: Jiwei Li, University of Massachusetts; Remote sensing retrieval of colored dissolved organic matter in optically shallow waters.
3rd place: Tengyun Hu, Tsinghua University; Detailed land use mapping of Beijing based on medium-resolution satellite images and Point of Interest data.
2015 RSSG Student Honors Paper Competition Winners
1st Place: Yuhong Zhou, University of Texas at Dallas; Object-level fusion of LiDAR pseudo-waveforms and HSR multi-spectral data for land cover mapping.
2nd Place: Chen Shi, University at Buffalo, The State University of New York; Spatial statistical detection of homogenous regions for remotely sensed imagery.
3rd Place: Xuecao Li, Center of Earth System Science, Tsinghua University; A 30-year (1984-2013) record of annual impervious surface dynamics of Beijing City derived from Landsat Data.
2014 RSSG Student Honors Paper Competition Winners
1st Place: Yanlei Chen, University of California, Berkeley; BITE: an algorithm for mapping chronic forest disturbances caused by mountain pine beetles with Landsat TM image stacks (Award prize = $500).
2nd Place: Lucy K. Tetteh, Mississippi State University; A multi-decadal remote sensing study on glacial change in the North Patagonia (Award prize = $250).
3rd Place: Matthew Dannenberg, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill; Evidence of the El Niño-Southern Oscillation influencing variability in land surface phenology and productivity in the western United States (Award prize = $150).
2013 RSSG Student Honors Paper Competition Winners
1st Place: Niti Mishra, University of Texas – Austin; “Relating Spatial Patterns of Fractional Land Cover to Savanna Vegetation Morphology using Multi-scale Remote Sensing in the Central Kalahari” (Award prize = $500).
2nd Place: Wenkai Li, University of California-Merced; “A New Accuracy Assessment Method for One-Class Classification of Remote Sensing Data” (Award prize = $250).
3rd Place: Chunyuan Diao, University at Buffalo; “Development of an Invasive Species Distribution Model with Fine-Resolution Remote Sensing” (Award prize = $150).
2012 RSSG Student Honors Paper Competition Winners
1st Place: Amy E. Frazier, State University of New York at Buffalo, Super-Resolution Land Cover Mapping using Landscape Metrics (Award prize = $500).
2nd Place: Iryna Dronova, University of California at Berkeley, Landscape analysis of wetland plant functional types: the effects of image segmentation scale, vegetation classes and classification methods (Award prize = $250).
3rd Place: Amy L. McCleary, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, A Comparison of Support Vector Machine and Object Based Image Analysis Approaches for Mapping Land Use/Cover: A Case Study of the Galápagos Islands (Award prize = $150).
2011 RSSG Student Honors Paper Competition Winners
1st Place
Benjamin W. Heumann (University of North Carolina)
“A comparison of spectral and spatial techniques to map mangrove forest canopy structure”
Prize: $500.00
2nd Place
Nicholas Cuba (Clark University)
“Modeling Spatio-Temporal Variation in Deciduousness in the Southern Yucatan Peninsula Using MODIS Vegetation Indices, 2000-2010
Prize: $250.00
3rd Place
Sachidananda Mishra (Mississippi State University)
“A Quasi-Analytical Algorithm to Quantify Phycocyanin Concentration in Turbid Productive Waters”
Prize: $150.00
2010 Remote Sensing Student Honors Papers Awards
First Place
Caiyun Zhang, University of Texas-Dallas
Prize: $500
Second Place
Nicholas Giner, Clark University
Prize: $250
Third Place
Sachidananda Mishra, Mississippi State University
Prize: $150
2009 RSSG Student Honors Paper Competition Winners
First Place
Daniel Redo, Texas A&M University
“A Hybrid Remote Sensing Protocol for Tracking Land Change Types in the Seasonal Tropics.”
Second Place
Xuefei Hu, Indiana State University
“Impervious Surface Extractions from IKONOS Imagery Using Object-Based Approach.”
Third Place
Jahan Kariyeva, University of Arizona
“Land Surface Phenological Responses to Changes in Land and Water Use, Climate and Socio-Economic: Central Asia Before and After the USSR Collapse.”
2008 RSSG Student Honors Paper Competition Winners
First Place
Jose Silvan (Texas State University at San Marcos)
Presentation Title: Retrieval of sub-pixel Tamarix canopy cover from Landsat data along the Forgotten River: Assessing the influence of multiple scattering
Prize: $500
Second Place
Wenhui Wang (University of Maryland at College Park)
Presentation Title: Estimating High Spatial Resolution Clear-Sky Land Surface Downwelling Longwave Radiation from MODIS Data
Prize: $300
Third Place
Joseph Fortier (Clark University)
Presentation Title: Utilizing temporally invariant training sites to classify multiple dates of satellite imagery
Prize: $200
2007 RSSG Student Honors Paper Competition
First Place
Amy Neuenschwander – University of Texas at Austin
Presentation Title: Assessing Temporal Dynamics Using Landsat TM/ETM+: Disturbance and Resilience in the Okavango Delta, Botswana
Prize: $500
Second Place
Junmei Tang – Texas State University at San Marcos
Presentation Title: Modeling urban landscape dynamics through fuzzy CA model
Prize: $300
Third Place
Kuan Song – University of Maryland at College Park
Presentation Title: A Geolocation Accuracy Assessment of NASA Landsat GeoCover
Prize: $200
Honorable Mentions
Evan Ellicott – University of Maryland at College Park
Presentation Title: Global Estimates Of Biomass Burning Particulate Matter Using Fire Radiative Power
Prize: Clark Labs IDRISI License
Tao Zheng – University of Maryland at College Park
Presentation Title: Mapping Incident Photosynthetically Active Radiation From AVHRR Data
Prize: Leica Geosystems ERDAS Imagine License
Marco Millones – Clark University
Presentation Title: Follies and fixes of commonly used indices of categorical map comparison in land change simulation models
Prize: ESRI ArcGIS License
2006 RSSG Student Honors Paper Competition Winners
First Place
Densheng Liu – University of California at Berkeley
Presentation Title: Detecting Sudden Oak Death Dynamics from Multi-temporal High Spatial Resolution Imagery
Prize: $500 and RSI ENVI 4.2 license
Second Place
Amy McCleary – University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Presentation Title: A Multi-temporal Classification Approach to Isolating Seasonal Variation in Landuse/Landcover Change in the Peruvian Amazon
Prize: $250 and Clark Labs IDRISI Andes license
Third Place
Guiyan Zhou – Louisiana State University
Presentation Title: Reducing the Edge Effects in the Classification of High-resolution Imagery
Prize: $150
2005 RSSG Student Honors Paper Competition Winners
First Place
Qi Chen – University of California Berkeley (Presenter)
Presentation Title: Isolating Individual Trees in a Savanna Woodland Using Small Footprint LIDAR Data.
Second Place
Lei Wang – Texas A & M University (Presenter)
Presentation Title: Wavelet-transform Based Edge Detection Approach to Derivation of Snowmelt Information from Satellite Passive Microwave Measurements.
Third Place
Xin Miao – University of California Berkeley (Presenter)
Presentation Title: Estimation of Yellow Starthistle Cover through CASI-2 Hyperspectral Imagery Using Linear Spectral Mixture Models.
Undergraduate Award
Christopher Lippitt – Clark University (Presenter)
Presentation Title: Timber Harvest: A Comparison of Machine Learning Classifiers.
2004 RSSG Student Honors Paper Competition Winners
First Place
Elena Tarnavsky – San Diego State University (Presenter)
Presentation Title: Fidelity of scanned and direct digital imagery in a land-cover change context.
Second Place
Qinghua Guo – University of California Berkeley (Presenter)
Presentation Title: An object-based classification method in detecting Sudden Oak Death.
Third Place
Claudia M. Stickler – University of Florida (Presenter)
Presentation Title: Predicting the complexity of primate habitat selection in Kibale National Park, Western Uganda, using multi-scale spatial analysis and remote sensing.
Undergraduate Award
Christopher Lippitt – Clark University (Presenter)
Presentation Title: A method to distinguish real landscape change from map error during map comparison.