For some time, all branches of the military have used a wide range of sensors to provide data for many purposes, including surveillance, reconnoitring, target detection and battle damage assessment. Many nations have also attempted to utilise these sensors for civilian applications, such as crop monitoring, agricultural disease tracking, environmental diagnostics, cartography, ocean temperature profiling, urban planning, and the characterisation of the Ozone Hole above Antarctica. The recent convergence of several important technologies has made possible new, advanced, high performance,...

For some time, all branches of the military have used a wide range of sensors to provide data for many purposes, including surveillance, reconnoitring, target detection and battle damage assessment. Many nations have also attempted to utilise these sensors for civilian applications, such as crop monitoring, agricultural disease tracking, environmental diagnostics, cartography, ocean temperature profiling, urban planning, and the characterisation of the Ozone Hole above Antarctica. The recent convergence of several important technologies has made possible new, advanced, high performance,...