Tehran University of Medical Sciences Journal of Arthropod-Borne Diseases 2322-1984 14 1 2019 08 03 1258 1258 Mohammad Reza Shirzadi Communicable Diseases Management Center, Ministry of Health and Medical Education, Tehran, Iran Mohammad Javanbakht Department of Remote Sensing and GIS, Faculty of Geography, Tehran University, Tehran, Iran Hassan Vatandoost Department of Medical Entomology and Vector Control, School of Public Health, Tehran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran AND Department of Chemical Pollutants and Pesticides, Institute for Environmental Research, Tehran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran Nahid Jesri Remote Sensing and GIS Centre, Shahid Beheshti University, Tehran, Iran Abedin Saghafipour Department of Public Health, Faculty of Health, Qom University of Medical Sciences, Qom, Iran Reza Fouladi-Fard Research Center for Environmental Pollutants, Qom University of Medical Sciences, Qom, Iran Alireza Omidi-Oskouei Department of Public Health, Faculty of Health, Qom University of Medical Sciences, Qom, Iran 2020 03 23 Background: Cutaneous leishmaniasis (CL) is a dermal and parasitic disease.. The aim of this study was to determine the effect of environmental and climate factors on spatial distribution of CL in northeastern Iran by utilizing remote sensing from 20 March 2016 to 19 March 2017. Methods: In this ecological study, the data were divided into two parts: The descriptive data on human CL cases were gathered from Communicable Diseases center of Iran. The remote sensing techniques and satellite imagery data (TRMM, MODIS-Aqua, MODIS-Terra and AMSR-2 with spatial resolution 0.25°, 0.05°, 5600m and 10km) of environ­mental and climate factors were used to determine the spatial pattern changes of cutaneous leishmaniasis inci­dence. Results: The incidence of CL in North Khorasan, Razavi Khorasan, and South Khorasan was 35.80 per 100,000 people (309/863092), 34.14 per 100,000 people (2197/6,434,501) and 7.67 per 100,000 people (59/768,898), respectively. The incidence of CL had the highest correlation with soil moisture and evapotranspiration. Moreover, the incidence of dis­ease was significantly correlated with Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) and air humidity while it had the lowest correlation with rainfall. Furthermore, the CL incidence had an indirect correlation relation with the air tem­perature meaning that with an increase in the temperature, the incidence of disease decreased. Conclusion: As such, the incidence of disease was also higher in the northern regions; most areas of North Khorasan and northern regions of Razavi Khorasan; where the rainfall, vegetation, specific humidity, evapotranspiration, and soil moisture was higher than the southern areas. https://jad.tums.ac.ir/index.php/jad/article/view/1258 https://jad.tums.ac.ir/index.php/jad/article/download/1258/483