CTCD: Prof. Shaun Quegan

Prof. Shaun Quegan

Background and research interests
My background is fairly varied, with a B.A. in Mathematics, an M.Sc. in Theoretical Statistics (both from the University of Warwick) and a Ph.D. from the University of Sheffield concerned with upper atmosphere/ionosphere modelling. I've also taught in schools for seven years (this included running a maths department in a big comprehensive for 3 years). My involvement with Earth Observation started after my Ph.D., when I was lucky enough to join an excellent Remote Sensing Group at Marconi Research Centre, where, after a couple of years, I became Group Chief of the Remote Sensing Applications Group. The background this provided was put to good use when I joined the University of Sheffield in 1986, where I rapidly built up a very successful research group working on Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR). In 1993 I became the Director of the new multi-disciplinary Sheffield Centre for Earth Observation Science (SCEOS), which brought together the very many strands of EO research in the University, and was particularly successful in connecting across disciplines, from ecology to engineering, from statistics to geography and all points in between. This provided the basis on which to build the Centre for Terrestrial Carbon Dynamics, whose connections range not only across disciplines but also across key research groups within the UK and beyond. Currently, I chair the Terrestrial Carbon Observations Panel, I'm a member of the ESA EO Science Advisory Committee and TerraSAR Advisory Group, and also of the NASDA Kyoto and Carbon Panel.

A large part of my earlier research dealt with understanding SAR images, which have particular properties related to the physics of microwave scattering and the signal processing that produces the images. I increasingly used this understanding in support of a range of land applications. Latterly, I'm much more interested in using information recovered from the whole gamut of remote sensing instruments, in combination with models and other sources of data, in order to support carbon cycle science.

Selected publications
C J Oliver and S Quegan (1998), Understanding synthetic aperture radar images, Artech House.

Grover, K.D., Quegan, S. and Yanasse, C.C.F., 'Quantitative estimation of tropical forest cover by SAR', IEEE Trans. Geosci. Remote Sensing, vol.37, 479-490, 1999.

Quegan S., T. Le Toan, J. J. Yu, F. Ribbes and N. Floury, 'Multitemporal ERS SAR analysis applied to forest monitoring', IEEE Trans. Geosci. Remote Sensing, vol. 38, no. 2, pp. 741-753, 2000.

S Quegan and J J Yu (2001), 'Recursive multi-channel filtering of SAR images', IEEE Trans. Geosci. Remote Sensing, 39, no. 11, pp. 2373-2379.

S Quegan and T. Le Toan (2002). 'Embedding remote sensing data in models for forest carbon dynamics', Proc. Third International Symp. on Retrieval of Bio- and Geophysical Parameters from SAR Data for Land Applications, Sheffield, September 2001, ESA SP-475, pp. 215-222.

W Wagner, A Luckman, J Vietmeier, K Tansey, H Balzter, C Schmullius, M.Davidson, D Gaveau, M Gluck, T Le Toan, S Quegan, A Shvidenko, A Wiesmann and J J Yu, (2003), 'Large-scale mapping of boreal forest in Siberia using ERS tandem coherence and JERS backscatter data', Remote Sensing of Environment 85, pp. 125-144.

S. C. M. Brown, S Quegan, Keith Morrison, J C. Bennett and G Cookmartin (2003), High resolution measurements of scattering in wheat canopies - implications for crop parameter retrieval, IEEE Trans. Geosci. Remote Sensing, 41, no. 7, 1602-1610.

P. Wright, S. Quegan, N. Wheadon and D. Hall, 'Faraday Rotation Effects on L-band Spaceborne SAR Data', IEEE Trans. Geosci. Remote Sensing (in press).

Le Toan, T., Quegan, S., Woodward, F.I., Lomas, M.R. & Delbart, N. (2003). 'Radar remote sensing of biomass combined with dynamic vegetation modelling to assess carbon budgets of forests', Climatic Change (in press).

Contact details
Professor Shaun Quegan
Director, CTCD
University of Sheffield
Hicks Building
Hounsfield Rd
Sheffield S3 7RH, UK.
Tel: +44 114 222 3778
Office: +44 114 222 3803
Fax: +44 114 222 3809
E-mail: S.Quegan at sheffield dot ac dot uk

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