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Alan R. Gillespie
Professor Dept of Earth and Space Sciences UW-ESS; Mailstop 351310 University of Washington Seattle, WA 98195-1310 Office: 343 Johnson Hall Phone : 206-685-8265 Fax (shared) : 206-685-2379 Email : alan@rad.ess.washington.edu |
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Alan Gillespie is a Quaternary geologist and works in the Remote Sensing Laboratory. His research
interests are in glacial geomorphology, geochronology and landform evolution. His interest in remote sensing
is in its application to these problems. Gillespie is currently supported by funds from NASA, NSF, and Save
the Earth Foundation.
Gillespie is a member of the Japanese-American ASTER team, which is designing and building a visible-thermal multispectral scanner which will orbit earth later this decade. From a geologist's viewpoint, thermal images are especially interesting because they discriminate effectively among different silicate minerals, which comprise most of the land surface of earth. Gillespie uses ASTER images of glacial moraines and outwash fans as part of a study of paleoclimatic conditions in central Asia and North America during the beginning of the last glaciation, 100,000 years ago. He is also an investigator on the SIR-C project, which will acquire synthetic-aperture radar images from the Space Shuttle. Gillespie and Robin Weeks, a postdoctoral research associate, will use the radar images to study the smoothing of alluvial fan surfaces and lava flows as they weather. This research is part of a long-term study using remote-sensing data to estimate relative ages of geomorphic landforms. A major focus of the Remote Sensing Laboratory is the development and application of special algorithms that treat images as consisting of spectral mixtures, to measure vegetation. This technology is being used to study patterns of deforestation and regrowth in the Pacific Northwest. |