In this NASA investigation, "What's Hot at the Mall," students examine how shopping malls change natural environments by examining thermal images gathered by NASA showing an area in Huntsville, Alabama. 

This lesson walks students through the use of Landsat false-color imagery and identification of different land cover features using these as models.

Students identify and classify kinds of land cover (such as vegetation, urban areas, water, and bare soil) in Landsat satellite images of Phoenix, Arizona taken in 1984 and 2018.

Students learn how to estimate the "energy efficiency" of photosynthesis, or the amount of energy that plants absorb for any given location on Earth. This is the ratio of the amount of energy stored to the amount of light energy absorbed and is used to evaluate and model photosynthesis efficiency.