Conclusion

Applying remote sensing techniques to the south-eastern region of Ukraine illustrates the ability for satellite imagery to provide insight on the effect of the Russia-Ukraine war, especially when on-the-ground information is unreliable or difficult to obtain. The obtained imagery often reflects the conflict in great detail, including small-scale incidents and movements. 

Through analysis of night-time imagery, we are able to observe trends in areas under attack, as well as offensive strategies used by both Ukraine and Russia. Month-by-month trends in the night-time activity of individual cities are clearly visible in VIIRS data. However, additional quantitative data, as well as higher-resolution data, may be useful for predicting day-by-day trends within the scale of single cities or battlegrounds. While lower-resolution night-time illumination data obtained through VIIRS is easier to analyze, the spatial resolution limits the scale of our analysis. 

We use analysis of NDVI values across a region of Ukraine near the front line to answer questions about territorial changes and the effect of the war on agriculture. While the war's front line is very distinguishable, our research is not as conclusive on the effect on agricultural yield. We observe some minor effects in agricultural output, consistent with Deininger et al. (2023). Additionally, the Landsat OLI imagery for the region was frequently obscured by clouds or distorted, which affected the scope from which we could discern changes in agricultural yield.. 

Some potential areas for future study include showing continuous lighting conditions on a daily or near-daily basis for populated areas in the country. Secondly, we hope to perform classification of crop types and farmland area in areas affected by the war, which may provide more quantifiable evidence of crop yield change.