Reference systems and frames are of primary importance for many Earth science applications, satellite navigation as well as for practical applications in geo-information. A precisely defined reference frame is needed for the quantification of, e.g. Earth rotation and its gravity field, global and regional sea level variation, tectonic motion and deformation, post-glacial rebound, geocenter motion, large scale deformation due to Earthquakes, local subsidence and other ruptures and crustal dislocations. All of these important scientific applications fundamentally depend on a truly global reference system that only space geodesy can realize. This volume details the proceedigns of the IAG Symposium REFAG2010 (Marne la Vallée, France, October 4-8, 2010) The primary scope of REFAG2010 was to address today’s achievements on theoretical concepts of reference systems and their practical implementations by individual space geodetic techniques and their combinations, underlying limiting factors, systematic errors and novel approaches for future improvements.

IAG Scientific Assembly, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, September, 3-9, 1997

Geodesy is the science of accurately measuring and understanding three fundamental properties of Earth: its geometric shape, its orientation in space, and its gravity field, as well as the changes of these properties with time. Over the past half century, the United States, in cooperation with international partners, has led the development of geodetic techniques and instrumentation. Geodetic observing systems provide a significant benefit to society in a wide array of military, research, civil, and commercial areas, including sea level change monitoring, autonomous navigation, tighter low flying routes for strategic aircraft, precision agriculture, civil surveying, earthquake monitoring, forest structural mapping and biomass estimation, and improved floodplain mapping. Recognizing the growing reliance of a wide range of scientific and societal endeavors on infrastructure for precise geodesy, and recognizing geodetic infrastructure as a shared national resource, this book provides an independent assessment of the benefits provided by geodetic observations and networks, as well as a plan for the future development and support of the infrastructure needed to meet the demand for increasingly greater precision. Precise Geodetic Infrastructure makes a series of focused recommendations for upgrading and improving specific elements of the infrastructure, for enhancing the role of the United States in international geodetic services, for evaluating the requirements for a geodetic workforce for the coming decades, and for providing national coordination and advocacy for the various agencies and organizations that contribute to the geodetic infrastructure.

The Cause of Gravity: The Holy Grail of all Scientific Revelation For over four centuries now, Natural Philosophers and Theoretical Physicists have been desperately searching for the answer to that elusive and intractable question that is still hanging around today: "What is the true cause of Gravity?" The present-day view by Theoretical Physics Academia is that gravity can be described as: "curved, or warped, space, or spacetime." So, how does this space, or spacetime, curve, or warp? Do certain particles of space get closer together in one vicinity of space and further apart in another? Are there compressions and rarefactions in space like there are in air? How can empty space form a path for a moving object to travel through if it is completely empty? The answer is that: Space is NOT empty. According to a brand-new type of physics called: "Reality Physics", we now know that space is not empty but contains an "active" plenum structure that is continually being created by the "active", two-dimensional, outward motion of Time with Space. What this actually means is that the "Now Point" in Time expands outward into space with an "active", two-dimensional, omnidirectional, omnipositional displacement at the Speed of Light, or: "c" = 299, 792, 458 meters per second, and that it also forms an "inertial reference background pressure density" throughout the universe. We find that by placing a body of mass into this active inertial reference background pressure density we can create a vicinity of "less active pressure density" at that location where the mass is located. This would, obviously, cause the greater pressure density surrounding the mass to implode with an "accelerating motion" down towards the surface of the mass body where the pressure density is less. We call this implosively accelerating motion of the inertial reference background: "Gravitational Acceleration", and this is what actually causes small objects to "fall to the ground" at the surface of the large body of mass. Gravity is an "action", not a curvature or warpage of anything, and therefore it must be caused by an "action", as revealed here by: "ACTION GRAVITY" of Reality Physics.

Uses real-world examples to show how to optimise the performance of locating and positioning systems.