On January 30, the resolution corresponding to the XVII “Pare Tosca” Award for Cartography and Territory was published in the Official Journal of the Generalitat Valenciana (DOGV). This award aims to recognize and promote technical innovation, ingenuity, and research in areas related to cartography, as well as in related disciplines such as remote sensing and geodesy, bringing this applied science closer to new generations and future professionals. To this end, the award is structured into two categories: one for undergraduate theses and another for master's theses.

In the master's category, the awarded work is titled “Empirical models for the estimation of air at surface level in Spanish Mediterranean basins”, authored by Joan Vedrí, a student of the 2023-2024 Master's in Remote Sensing program. Under the supervision of Dr. Raquel Niclòs and Dr. Lluís Pérez-Planells, this study proposes various methods based on Machine Learning and Deep Learning techniques to estimate air temperature using satellite imagery, reanalysis data, as well as geographical and topographical information.

Surface-level air temperature is classified as an essential climate variable by the Global Climate Observing System (GCOS), highlighting the importance of its monitoring in the current context of climate change. Furthermore, the Mediterranean region of the Iberian Peninsula has been particularly affected by these changes, making this study a key tool for generating continuous maps that allow the study of air temperature in an area of great climatic interest.