Biographies

Simon Hook
Research Scientist, NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory

Contact Information:
Phone: 818-354-0974
Email:

Biography:
Simon Hook is a geologist in the Solid Earth Group, Earth Sciences Section. His research is focused on improving our understanding of geologic and hydrodynamic processes. Recently he has started to apply his knowledge of terrestrial geologic processes to other planets, in particular Mars. He is currently leading an international team of interdisciplinary scientists to relate recent observations of Mars to terrestrial environments and their relationship to water and life.

Simon is an expert on optical radiometry, in particular thermal infrared spectroscopy. He is a member of several instrument teams including ASTER, MODIS, NPP, Landsat and AATSR. He has developed validation sites at Lake Tahoe, CA/NV and Salton Sea CA for determining the absolute radiometry of airborne and spaceborne mid and thermal infrared radiometers and surface temperature retrieval algorithms. The measurements at the sites are unique and now used as an absolute reference standard for multiple instruments developed by both domestic and foreign research agencies.

Simon continues to develop new instrumentation, especially radiometers, in support of scientific studies. He is currently working with colleagues to demonstrate a new design for an airborne thermal imaging spectrometer. A key aspect of Simon's research is the development of new techniques to analyze and extract critical information from optical remotely sensed data, in particular, temperature and emissivity. Techniques developed by Simon are widely used by researchers and have been incorporated into commercial packages.

Simon is actively involved in planning activities at NASA and other agencies and is currently participating in a group to develop a set of land measurement requirements for future NASA land-related missions.

Research Area:
Calibration and Validation
Using Large Lakes a Climate Change Indicators