Monitoring the Earth's ground surface movements using satellite observations: Geodinamics of the Italian peninsula determined by using GNSS networks

Geodetic techniques, such as Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS), Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR), satellite gravity missions, etc., have made significant contributions in assessment temporal and spatial changes in Earth's ground surface and atmosphere. A new crustal velocity field for the Alpine Mediterranean area (Farolfi & Del Ventisette, 2015) was calculated by using 6.5 years of GNSS permanent stations observations. Thus, processing was performed by using state-of-the-art antenna phase center model, new recomputed satellite orbits and a new more accurate tropospheric model. The scope of this work is to analyzethe spatial variations of continuous GNSS series, to determine crustal velocities in the Alpine Mediterranean area. The resulting velocity field gives a strong contribution in the framework of the contemporary geodynamics. Moreover, the high accuracy of GNSS velocity sites provides the correct dataset for the validation of satellite SAR Interferometry. Italy's the foundation for the determination of a more detailed surface motion map by merging GNSS with SAR datasets.