%A Rembold,Felix %A Meroni,Michele %A Urbano,Ferdinando %A Royer,Antoine %A Atzberger,Clement %A Lemoine,Guido %A Eerens,Herman %A Haesen,Dominque %D 2015 %J Frontiers in Environmental Science %C %F %G English %K remote sensing,crop monitoring,image time series,Agriculture,Food security analysis %Q %R 10.3389/fenvs.2015.00046 %W %L %M %P %7 %8 2015-July-15 %9 Original Research %+ Dr Felix Rembold,Joint Research Centre of the European Commission,Institute for Environment and Sustainability,Via Enrico Fermi 2749,Ispra,21027,Italy,felix.rembold@jrc.ec.europa.eu %# %! SPIRITS software: new functionalities and use examples %* %< %T Remote sensing time series analysis for crop monitoring with the SPIRITS software: new functionalities and use examples %U https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fenvs.2015.00046 %V 3 %0 JOURNAL ARTICLE %@ 2296-665X %X Monitoring crop and natural vegetation conditions is highly relevant, particularly in the food insecure areas of the world. Data from remote sensing image time series at high temporal and medium to low spatial resolution can assist this monitoring as they provide key information about vegetation status in near real-time over large areas. The Software for the Processing and Interpretation of Remotely sensed Image Time Series (SPIRITS) is a stand-alone flexible analysis environment created to facilitate the processing and analysis of large image time series and ultimately for providing clear information about vegetation status in various graphical formats to crop production analysts and decision makers. In this paper we present the latest functional developments of SPIRITS and we illustrate recent applications. The main new developments include: HDF5 importer, Image re-projection, additional options for temporal Smoothing and Periodicity conversion, computation of a rainfall-based probability index (Standardized Precipitation Index) for drought detection and extension of the Graph composer functionalities. The examples of operational analyses are taken from several recent agriculture and food security monitoring reports and bulletins. We conclude with considerations on future SPIRITS developments also in view of the data processing requirements imposed by the coming generation of remote sensing products at high spatial and temporal resolution, such as those provided by the Sentinel sensors of the European Copernicus programme.