The Research and Development in Geographic Information Centre (CIAF) of IGAC, UN-SPIDER's Regional Support Office in Colombia, is working on the development of tools for disaster management and disaster relief.
One of its products is an application called SEMARK (Forest Fire Severity Markov Classification), which is the result of research conducted within the framework of a PhD thesis on the use of remote sensing techniques in forest fires.
SEMARK creates classifications of spectral indices derived from satellite imagery (NBR, NDVI, and SAVI) classifiers using Markov random fields (MRF). Based on the results, SEMARK can be used as an initial tool in the identification and quantification of areas affected by forest fires.
More information: alexander.ariza [at] igac.gov.co and sergio.rojas [at] igac.gov.co
