Dr. Thomas D. Frank is interested in the environmental consequences of disturbing arid and semi-arid lands, particularly the Mojave Desert of southern California. His research has been focused on remote sensing and environmental information systems, combined with field measurements, to understand the affects of cattle grazing, military training, and off-highway vehicles on the carrying capacity of desert lands.

This research has recently studied the spatial and temporal variability of aerosol optical depths using NASA’s MISR instrument onboard the Terra Platform, the effects of spatial resolution on measurement of vegetation cover, and the non-destructive estimation of canopy gap fractions and volume of desert shrubs. Recently Dr. Frank has collaborated with colleagues in the Department of Atmospheric Sciences to study regional aerosol trends in the western United States, and the Program in Ecology and Evolutionary Biology to study physiological processes in leaves using new and advanced imaging technologies. He is the Director of the Spatial Data Analysis Laboratory in the School of Earth, Society and Environment at the University of Illinois.

tdfrank@uiuc.edu | 217-333-7248 | 220 Davenport Hall

Spatial Data Analysis Laboratory