A common knowledge database for remote sensing and geographic information in a change-detection expert system

Remote sensing (RS) and geographic information systems (GIS) can provide essential support for each other's operations. RS can provide information on current and changed land-use cover for a GIS, and, more importantly, a GIS can provide an essential expert knowledge base to help automate the technically demanding aspects of RS change-detection analysis. No commercially available system provides effective support for this important synergistic relationship. A prototype integration of both RS and GIS processing in association with an expert system has been developed. Vector and raster data are stored in a unified database which is accessed by an expert system to control key aspects of RS change detection. New RS interpretations are accumulated in the common database, providing potential for developing a system with a 'learning' function. The results show there is good promise for reducing some of the technical aspects of RS change analysis which have limited its application by practising planners, and for providing a significantly improved regional analysis tool.