New NCALM datasets in California and Arizona now available

Two new Seed grant datasets from NCALM (National Center for Airborne Laser Mapping) are now available from OpenTopography. On July 13th 2021 a lidar dataset within the Sierra Nevada mountains in California was collected for Justin Higa at University of California, Los Angeles. This dataset was collected to help analyze topographic and lithologic controls on subsurface weathering in the Sierra Nevada mountains. In addition, between July 10-11 2021, a dataset was collected for Conor McMahon at the University of California, Santa Barbara. This dataset was collected to provide riparian vegetation mapping, classification, and to measure historic drought response over the San Pedro river in southern Arizona.

NCALM is an NSF-funded center that supports the use of airborne laser mapping technology (a.k.a. lidar) in the scientific community and is jointly operated by the Department of Civil & Environmental Engineering, Cullen College of Engineering, University of Houston and the Department of Earth and Planetary Science, University of California, Berkeley. OpenTopography is the primary distributor of NCALM data.

Find the data here:

• Topographic and Lithologic Controls on Subsurface Weathering, CA 2021
• Lidar Survey of the San Pedro River, AZ 2021

Point cloud colored by elevation of a forested slope for the dataset, Topographic and Lithologic Controls on Subsurface Weathering, CA 2021

Contours overlaid on a hillshade of a Digital Terrain Model (DTM). Dinkey Creek is on left side of image (dataset: Topographic and Lithologic Controls on Subsurface Weathering, CA 2021).

Digital Terrain Model (DTM) of a section of the San Pedro river in southern Arizona (dataset: Lidar Survey of the San Pedro River, AZ 2021).

3D point cloud colored by intensity over a section of the San Pedro river in southern Arizona (dataset: Lidar Survey of the San Pedro River, AZ 2021).