Glennie, Craig L.2019-11-08August 2012019-08August 201https://hdl.handle.net/10657/5332Recently, Geiger-mode and single photon lidar sensors have emerged on the commercial market, advertising greater collection efficiency than traditional linear mode lidar systems. Non-linear photon detection is a new technology for the geospatial community, and its performance characteristics for surveying and mapping are not yet well understood. The goal of this thesis, therefore, is to examine the geospatial quality of the data produced by one of these new sensors, the Leica SPL100. The SPL100 was shown to have a lower ranging precision than linear lidar and that its precision is more negatively affected by surface properties such as low intensity, roughness, and slope. The accuracy of the SPL100, however, was found to be comparable to that produced by linear lidar for smooth horizontal surfaces. It was also observed that the post-processed SPL100 data has limited ability to resolve multiple returns through vegetation due to the current filtering algorithms employed.application/pdfengThe author of this work is the copyright owner. UH Libraries and the Texas Digital Library have their permission to store and provide access to this work. Further transmission, reproduction, or presentation of this work is prohibited except with permission of the author(s).LiDARSingle photon LiDARRemote sensing2019-11-08Thesisborn digital