• Journal of Space Technology and Applications
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• v.3 no.2
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• pp.118-143
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• 2023

Space is becoming more commercialized. Despite of its delayed start-up, space activities in Korea are attracting more nation-wide supports from both investors and government. May 25, 2023, KSLV II, also called Nuri, successfully transported, and inserted seven satellites to a sun-synchronous orbit of 550 km altitude. However, Starlink has over 4,000 satellites around this altitude for its commercial activities. Hence, it is necessary for us to constantly monitor the collision risks of these satellites against resident space objects including Starlink. Here we report a quantitative research output regarding the conjunctions, particularly between the Nuri satellites and Starlink. Our calculation shows that, on average, three times everyday, the Nuri satellites encounter Starlink within 1 km distance with the probability of collision higher than 1.0E-5. A comparative study with KOMPSAT-5, also called Arirang-5, shows that its distance of closest approach distribution significantly differs from those of Nuri satellites. We also report a quantitative analysis of collision-avoiding maneuver cost of Starlink satellites and a strategy for Korea, being a delayed starter, to speed up to position itself in the space leading countries. We used the AstroOne program for analyses and compared its output with that of Socrates Plus of Celestrak. The two line element data was used for computation.

• Journal of the Korean earth science society
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• v.39 no.3
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• pp.241-249
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• 2018

As the international trade increases, vessel traffics around the Korean Peninsula are also increasing. Maritime accidents hence take place more frequently in the southern coast of Korea where many big and small ports are located. Accidents involving ship collision and sinking result in a substantial human and material damage as well as the marine environmental pollution. Therefore, it is necessary to locate the ships quickly when such accidents occur. In this study, we suggest a new ship detection index by comparing and analyzing the reflectivity of each channel of the Korea MultiPurpose SATellite-2 (KOMPSAT-2) images of the area around the Gwangyang Bay. A threshold value of 0.1 is set based on a histogram analysis, and all vessels are detected when compared with RGB composite images. After selecting a relatively large ship as a representative sample, the distribution of spatial reflectivity around the ship is studied. Uniform shadows are detected on the northwest side of the vessel. This indicates that the sun is in the southeast, the azimuth of the actual satellite image is $144.80^{\circ}$, and the azimuth angle of the sun can be estimated using the shadow position. The reflectivity of the shadows is 0.005 lower than the surrounding sea and ship. The shadow height varies with the position of the bow and the stern, perhaps due to the relative heights of the ship deck and the structure. The results of this study can help search technology for missing vessels using optical satellite images in the event of a marine accident around the Korean Peninsula.

• Korean Journal of Remote Sensing
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• v.37 no.5_2
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• pp.1295-1305
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• 2021

Satellite-derived ocean color products are required to effectively monitor clear open ocean and coastal water regions for various research fields. For this purpose, accurate correction of atmospheric effect is essential. Currently, the Geostationary Ocean Color Imager (GOCI)-II ground segment uses the reanalysis of meteorological fields such as European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF) or National Centers for Environmental Prediction (NCEP) to correct gas absorption by water vapor and ozone. In this process, uncertainties may occur due to the low spatiotemporal resolution of the meteorological data. In this study, we develop water vapor absorption correction model for the GK-2 combined GOCI-II atmospheric correction using Advanced Meteorological Imager (AMI) total precipitable water (TPW) information through radiative transfer model simulations. Also, we investigate the impact of the developed model on GOCI products. Overall, the errors with and without water vapor absorption correction in the top-of-atmosphere (TOA) reflectance at 620 nm and 680 nm are only 1.3% and 0.27%, indicating that there is no significant effect by the water vapor absorption model. However, the GK-2A combined water vapor absorption model has the large impacts at the 709 nm channel, as revealing error of 6 to 15% depending on the solar zenith angle and the TPW. We also found more significant impacts of the GK-2 combined water vapor absorption model on Rayleigh-corrected reflectance at all GOCI-II spectral bands. The errors generated from the TOA reflectance is greatly amplified, showing a large error of 1.46~4.98, 7.53~19.53, 0.25~0.64, 14.74~40.5, 8.2~18.56, 5.7~11.9% for from 620 nm to 865 nm, repectively, depending on the SZA. This study emphasizes the water vapor correction model can affect the accuracy and stability of ocean color products, and implies that the accuracy of GOCI-II ocean color products can be improved through fusion with GK-2A/AMI.

• Korean Journal of Remote Sensing
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• v.38 no.6_1
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• pp.1463-1478
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• 2022

Maritime transport accounts for 99.7% of the exports and imports of the Republic of Korea; therefore, developing a vessel monitoring system for efficient operation is of significant interest. Several studies have focused on tracking and monitoring vessel movements based on automatic identification system (AIS) data; however, ships without AIS have limited monitoring and tracking ability. High-resolution optical satellite images can provide the missing layer of information in AIS-based monitoring systems because they can identify non-AIS vessels and small ships over a wide range. Therefore, it is necessary to investigate vessel monitoring and small vessel classification systems using high-resolution optical satellite images. This study examined the possibility of developing ship monitoring systems using Compact Advanced Satellite 500-1 (CAS500-1) satellite images by first training a deep learning model using satellite image data and then performing detection in other images. To determine the effectiveness of the proposed method, the learning data was acquired from ships in the Yellow Sea and its major ports, and the detection model was established using the You Only Look Once (YOLO) algorithm. The ship detection performance was evaluated for a domestic and an international port. The results obtained using the detection model in ships in the anchorage and berth areas were compared with the ship classification information obtained using AIS, and an accuracy of 85.5% and 70% was achieved using domestic and international classification models, respectively. The results indicate that high-resolution satellite images can be used in mooring ships for vessel monitoring. The developed approach can potentially be used in vessel tracking and monitoring systems at major ports around the world if the accuracy of the detection model is improved through continuous learning data construction.