On July 3rd, 2012, at the Auditorium of the Institute of Geomatics (IG), Marta Blázquez defended her PhD thesis entitled "A systematic approach to airborne sensor orientation and calibration: method and models." The PhD research was supervised by IG's director Dr. Ismael Colomina.

The goal of the thesis is to establish a methodical basis of a systematic approach to airborne sensor orientation and calibration and to prove its validity with newly-developed models and applications. The thesis, organized as a collection of four peer reviewed papers and two proceeding papers, introduces the concepts of relative aerial control, of spatio-temporal orientation and calibration, of "Fast AT" and of dynamic networks. The contributions of Dr. Blázquez thesis are manifold and fundamental to the field of modern sensor orientation and calibration. The thesis research focused on frame cameras but its potential application scope is much broader, including line cameras, laser scanners and virtually any type of remote sensing data acquisition instrument. GENA stands for "Generic Extensible Network Approach" and is GN's software platform for parameter estimation under the paradigm of network modelling and estimation. GENA was a key tool for Dr. Blázquez research and, at the same time, has benefited from her research.

GeoNumerics is proud to announce its support to the EuroCOW 2012.

EuroCOW stands for The Calibration and Orientation Workshop, the generic name of a biennial series of workshops that already started with the EuroCOW 2006.

The EuroCOWs intend to bring together the world experts, both from public and private sectors, to present and discuss the recent findings and developments in the field of geomatic sensor calibration and orientation. The EuroCOWs are highly specialized, small forums to facilitate the circulation of useful and new information between photogrammetric, remote sensing, geodetic and navigation specialists interested in the spatial orientation of sensors and in their geometric and radiometric calibration.

GeoNumerics' generic network adjustment software platform GENA will be used in the "GAL: Galileo for Gravity" project for the measurement of the gravity field with inertial measurement units (IMUs) and GPS/Galileo receivers on board of aircraft; a technique known as "kinematic airborne GNSS/INS gravimetry."

In the GAL project, GeoNumerics contributes an extended capability of its GENA platform in order to handle millions of unknowns. This capability is a keystone in the implementation of the dynamic network approach (Colomina and Blázquez 2004) for the solution of large systems of differential and non-differential observation equations with applications to aerial, terrestrial and marine mobile mapping.

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