OT Blog
Information and discussion related to high-resolution lidar topography for the Earth sciences
Jan 23, 2026
Primary support for OpenTopography comes from the Division of Earth Sciences at the U.S. National Science Foundation, and thus, our principal emphasis is on facilitating access to topographic data oriented towards Earth science research and education. In the context of academic research, publications are a crucial metric for measuring impact and sustaining support for initiatives such as OpenTopography.
Since its initiation, OpenTopography data and resources have enabled:
1,500 peer-reviewed publications
182 undergraduate, masters and PhD theses
40 book sections
68 reports... more
Nov 24, 2025
OpenTopography hosts hundreds of high-resolution point cloud datasets covering more than 500,000 km² globally. While our web-based data portal provides intuitive point-and-click access to these data, researchers increasingly need programmatic methods to build automated, reproducible workflows. We're excited to share a new Jupyter notebook tutorial that demonstrates how to efficiently access OpenTopography's point cloud data using tile indexes and cloud-native streaming techniques.
The Challenge: Accessing Point Cloud Data Programmatically
OpenTopography's lidar datasets are organized... more
Apr 24, 2025
By Hayley Bricker
Utility companies, responsible for providing power, water, and telecommunications services, rely on precise, high-resolution 3D elevation data of the Earth’s surface to plan projects, maintain infrastructure, and mitigate natural hazards. Light ranging and detection, or lidar, provides a powerful solution, producing a high resolution, three-dimensional map of the Earth’s natural and built environments. From 3D point clouds, lidar scans can be used to generate digital terrain models (DTMs), which represent the bare surface of the Earth, and digital surface models (DSMs),... more
Feb 10, 2025
By Cassandra Brigham, Chelsea Scott, Christopher Crosby
On January 7th, 2025, the Palisades and Eaton fires ignited in Los Angeles County, causing destruction over a combined area of 60 square miles at the wildland-urban interface. The fires killed at least 29 people and destroyed over 16,000 homes and other buildings. Evaluating the short- and long-term impacts on burnt neighborhoods and the surrounding landscape is an essential part of the recovery effort and informs future hazard assessment and response. By comparing high-resolution 3D scans of the terrain and built environment... more
Feb 10, 2025
Primary support for OpenTopography comes from the Division of Earth Sciences at the U.S. National Science Foundation, and thus, our principal emphasis is on facilitating access to topographic data oriented towards Earth science research and education. In the context of academic research, publications are a crucial metric for measuring impact and sustaining support for initiatives such as OpenTopography.
Since its initiation, OpenTopography data and resources have enabled:
1,204 peer-reviewed publications
139 undergraduate, masters and PhD theses
34 book sections
57 reports... more
Sep 13, 2024
by Emily Zawacki
OpenTopography periodically highlights new research results that demonstrate the use and reuse of data from OpenTopography. These three publications highlight topographic research applications in fault geomorphology, botany, and ecology and wildlife management.
Fault mapping with drone lidar
Lidar is a cornerstone remote sensing method to produce bare-earth elevation models of the ground surface, revealing geomorphic features produced by tectonic faults. While lidar is traditionally collected through airborne or terrestrial laser scanning techniques, collecting lidar... more
Apr 22, 2024
by Emily Zawacki
OpenTopography periodically highlights new research results that demonstrate the use and reuse of data from OpenTopography. These three publications highlight topographic research applications in earthquake hazards, wildlife and conservation, and geomorphology.
Using lidar to assess building damage after earthquakes
Determining if and how much buildings were damaged during an earthquake is crucial for emergency response and recovery. Remote sensing techniques provide an efficient way to detect damaged buildings. However, some methods can only distinguish between... more
Feb 12, 2024
As part of OpenTopography’s mission to democratize access to high resolution topography and advance our understanding of Earth’s surface, vegetation, and the built environment, we are dedicated to developing and supporting educational uses of topographic data. To evaluate OpenTopography’s educational impact, we assessed the diversity and breadth of educational institutions that use OpenTopography. OpenTopography’s educational resources, datasets, and processing tools are used by students and faculty at a wide variety of educational institutions, illustrating the broad impact of... more
Jan 16, 2024
Primary support for OpenTopography comes from the Division of Earth Sciences at the U.S. National Science Foundation, and thus, our principal emphasis is on facilitating access to topographic data oriented towards Earth science research and education. In the context of academic research, publications are a crucial metric for measuring impact and sustaining support for initiatives such as OpenTopography. We actively monitor references to OpenTopography in the published literature using web-based searches of online journal databases, and annually compile this information for our use and for... more
Nov 16, 2023
by Cole Speed, 2023
The U.S. Geological Survey 3D Elevation Program (3DEP) is systematically acquiring and facilitating public access to high-quality light detection and ranging (lidar) data spanning the conterminous United States, Hawaii, and US territories over an 8-year period (2015-2023). Upon completion, 3DEP lidar data will provide the first-ever national baseline of consistent high-resolution elevation data – both 3D point cloud and bare earth – and will be instrumental in addressing the rapidly-growing need for accurate 3D representations of landscape topography, vegetation... more