The project target can be formulated as the development of an advanced pre-processing chain of airborne hyperspectral imagery (e.g. APEX) that considers vegetation structure effects and hence bidirectional effects on the captured reflectance signal, and the development of a methodology to extract forest thematic products from this processed imagery.

The ultimate and long-term goal of this project, beyond the project execution period, is to deliver hyperspectral imagery that can identify whether detected change in the state of vegetation is due to vegetation structure of bidirectional effects on the captured airborn hyperspectral signal or clue to changing forest phenology, i.e. structural (for instance more leaves) or physiologic changes (growth, senescing).