By Paul Aplin

One new volume of the ISPRS Book Series was published in 2009 - Volume 8, Recent Advances in Remote Sensing and Geoinformation Processing for Land Degradation Assessment, edited by Achim Röder and Joachim Hill. This volume covers recent theory and application in spatial investigation of desertification, and is suitable for general use by scientists, students, land managers and policy makers.

Three other volumes are in preparation - Earth Observation Small Satellites for Remote Sensing Applications, edited by Cracknell, Hashim and Ibrahim; Advances in Web-based GIS, edited by Li, Dragicevic and Veenendaal; and Environmental Tracking for Public Health Surveillance, edited by Morain, Sprigg and Budge - though these have all been subject to delay. Two further volume proposals are currently under discussion, respectively on 3D modelling and spatial data handling, and it is hoped that at least one of these volumes will be commissioned early in 2010.

Pleasingly, over the last year or so, reviews of published volumes have begun to appear in journals and other literature. Volumes 4, 5, 6 and 7 have been reviewed variously in the International Journal of Geographical Information Science, Photogrammetric Engineering & Remote Sensing, The Photogrammetric Record and elsewhere. These are generally good, critical commentaries of the volumes.