Historical paths to current unrest: Extending the temporal lens in analysing geographies of agrarian change and conflict

The proliferation of soybean monoculture and its expansion into previously marginal territories in Argentina have resulted in land conflicts and attacks on peasant communities that possess land without having secured tenure. However, the rapid and intensive modernisation and industrialisation of agriculture production has had differentiated effect on different territories in Argentina. This article posit that understanding these differences requires an extended temporal analysis. While social research tends to focus on the present or recent past, this paper joins calls for greater attention to historical context and processes when examining current social dynamics and geographies. Focusing on the province of Santiago del Estero in Northwest Argentina, this paper provides a particular temporal-thematic approach for conducting such a historical path analysis, which here focuses on the province’s changing agrarian structures and political shifts that resulted in a complex, irregular and subsequently unstable land tenure system.     

Ensemble simulation of land evapotranspiration in China based on a multi-forcing and multi-model approach

In order to reduce the uncertainty of offline land surface model(LSM) simulations of land evapotranspiration(ET), we used ensemble simulations based on three meteorological forcing datasets [Princeton, ITPCAS(Institute of Tibetan Plateau Research, Chinese Academy of Sciences), Qian] and four LSMs(BATS, VIC, CLM3.0 and CLM3.5), to explore the trends and spatiotemporal characteristics of ET, as well as the spatiotemporal pattern of ET in response to climate factors over mainland China during 1982–2007. The results showed that various simulations of each member and their arithmetic mean(Ens Mean) could capture the spatial distribution and seasonal pattern of ET sufficiently well, where they exhibited more significant spatial and seasonal variation in the ET compared with observation-based ET estimates(Obs MTE). For the mean annual ET, we found that the BATS forced by Princeton forcing overestimated the annual mean ET compared with Obs MTE for most of the basins in China, whereas the VIC forced by Princeton forcing showed underestimations. By contrast, the Ens Mean was closer to Obs MTE, although the results were underestimated over Southeast China. Furthermore, both the Obs MTE and Ens Mean exhibited a significant increasing trend during 1982–98; whereas after 1998, when the last big EI Ni ?no event occurred, the Ens Mean tended to decrease significantly between 1999 and 2007, although the change was not significant for Obs MTE. Changes in air temperature and shortwave radiation played key roles in the long-term variation in ET over the humid area of China, but precipitation mainly controlled the long-term variation in ET in arid and semi-arid areas of China.     

高建筑对周围建筑雷击保护距离的模拟

在已有先导连接参数化方案的基础上,选取近地面层为研究区域,保持方案中其他基本参量不变,通过改变闪电的空间形态,在同一建筑分布的背景下进行多次闪电模拟。研究多个建筑之间的屏蔽作用以及建筑雷击保护距离与建筑相关特征参数之间的关系,结果表明:高建筑对矮建筑具有屏蔽作用,并存在一个临界保护距离,当高、矮建筑高度分别为190 m和165 m,宽度均为20 m时,建筑之间的距离在12 m以内,矮建筑受高建筑完全保护不遭受雷击;建筑之间的距离超过12 m,矮建筑遭雷击次数明显增多。     

强度尺度分解方法在气候温度场检验中的应用

本文首次将Casati等提出的强度尺度分解方法应用到气候地表温度场的检验中,探讨此方法用于评估气候模拟场误差的详细空间信息的适用性。以新一代气候系统模式模拟的月平均地表温度为例,传统的统计分析方法（较为常用的是空间相关系数和均方根误差、EOF分析等）不能完全反映模拟场误差的空间信息;强度尺度分解方法可计算不同阈值和空间尺度上的均方误差和模拟技巧,评估对应的模拟能力,定量给出模拟场主要误差的空间信息（误差范围即温度阈值及对应的空间尺度）,例如,亚洲东部地区1月单年及多年平均的模拟场在230 K阈值1600 km模拟技巧非常低。本研究表明强度尺度分解方法适用于气候温度场的检验评估,能定量给出误差的空间信息。     

线性相关“可传递性”的几何意义

从几何角度对随机变量显著相关可传递性质进行了分析,得出了样本容量为n(n≥3)随机变量显著相关可传递性质的概率的几何表达式。用Monte-Carlo方法验证了几何分析的合理性,并对此问题展开了一定的讨论。     

改进支持向量机的高分遥感影像道路提取

针对支持向量机受分类数的限制在高分辨率遥感影像中无法直接获取高精度道路网信息的问题,该文提出一种新的混合的基于支持向量机的方法:首先,利用模糊C均值聚类方法将输入的遥感影像分为3类,以减少支持向量机的错分现象;其次,运用支持向量机将不同类别的像素分为道路类和非道路类;最后,应用马尔科夫随机场对分类结果进行噪声去除,并采用形态学进行后处理,进而得到精确道路网信息。实验结果表明:该算法不仅能够从高分辨率遥感影像中提取出道路网,而且精度优于直接使用支持向量机算法以及对比算法。     

基于随机森林模型的云南元阳梯田地形因子分析

为探究地形因子对梯田空间分布的影响,以云南元阳梯田坝达流域为研究区,运用GeoEye-1遥感卫星数据(2010年,1 m分辨率)和数字高程模型(20 m分辨率),提取梯田空间分布信息以及海拔高程、地形坡度、地形坡向、地面曲率、高程变异系数、地形起伏度、地面粗糙度、地表切割度、到水系距离9个地形因子。采用随机森林(Random Forest)方法建模,结合ROC曲线和AUC值对模型进行精度评价,根据随机置换残差均方减少量和因子作用曲线,探讨地形因子对梯田分布的影响规律。研究结果表明:该流域内梯田总面积1 158395 hm2,模型AUC值为0.947,海拔高度因子的随机置换残差均方减少量为38814,到水系距离因子为199.77,地面坡向因子为80.26,三者占总值的73.45%。由此可见,元阳梯田的空间分布主要受海拔高度、到水系距离、地面坡向3类地形因子的影响,其因子曲线表明梯田分布与地形因子间呈非线性关系。     

珠江流域降水集中度时空变化特征及成因分析

基于珠江流域内43个常规气象站点1960~2012年的逐日降水资料,计算了流域内各站点长期降水集中度(LCI)和逐年降水集中度(ACI);采用Mann-Kendall趋势检验法和Sen’s坡度检验法检测ACI时间上的变化趋势;同时采用反距离权重插值法(IDW)对LCI的区域特征和ACI的变化趋势进行空间插值以分析降水集中度的时空分布规律;采用随机森林(RF)算法对降水集中度的影响因子进行重要度分析。结果表明:(1)珠江流域逐年降水集中度ACI的年际变化不明显,东南部呈上升趋势,西北部呈下降趋势;(2)珠江流域西北部长期降水集中度LCI值偏小,即降水分布较平均;东南部长期降水集中度LCI值偏大,即降水较集中,表明该地区降水极值情况发生的几率相对较高,该空间分布趋势可能是受距离海洋的远近及海拔的影响;(3)众多气候影响因子中,东亚夏季季风(EASMI)对珠江流域的降水集中度影响最明显。     

Land-surface segmentation as a method to create strata for spatial sampling and its potential for digital soil mapping

Sampling efforts are constrained by limited availability of resources. Therefore, methods to reduce the number of samples, while still achieving reasonable accuracy are needed. Land-surface segmentation (LSS) has proven a powerful technique to partition digital elevation models (DEMs) and their derivatives into relatively homogeneous areas, which can be further employed as support in soil sampling. Though topography is one of the main soil forming factors, a robust assessment of the potential of this technique to digital soil mapping (DSM) is still missing. In this study, we aimed at evaluating the potential of LSS in stratifying a landscape into relatively homogeneous areas, which can be used as strata for guiding the selection of sampling points in DSM. The experiments were carried out in two study areas where soil samples were available. Land-surface derivatives were derived from DEMs and segmented with a tool based on the multiresolution segmentation algorithm, into objects considered as homogeneous soil-landscape divisions. Thus, one sample was randomly selected within each segment from the existing sample data, based on which predictions of soil classes/sub-orders and properties, i.e. soil texture and A-horizon thickness, were made. Results were compared with predictions based on simple random sampling (SRS) and conditioned Latin hypercube (cLHS). The segmentation-based sampling (SBS) scheme performed better than SRS and cLHS schemes in predicting the A-horizon thickness, soil texture fractions and soil classes, showing a high potential of LSS in stratifying a landscape for the purposes of DSM. The novelty of this study is in the way strata are constructed, rather than in the sampling design itself. Further research is needed to demonstrate the value of a SBS design for practical use. The analyses presented here further highlight the importance of considering locally adaptive techniques in optimization of sampling schemes and predictions of soil properties.     

Possibilities of land use change analysis in a mountainous rural area: a methodological approach

Decreasing population density is a current trend in the European Union, and causes a lower environmental impact on the landscape. However, besides the desirable effect on the regeneration processes of semi-natural forest ecosystems, the lack of traditional management techniques can also lead to detrimental ecological processes. In this study we investigated the land use pattern changes in a micro-region (in North-Eastern Hungary) between 1952 and 2005, based on vectorised land use data from archive aerial photos. We also evaluated the methodology of comparisons using GIS methods, fuzzy sets and landscape metrics. We found that both GIS methods and statistical analysis of landscape metrics resulted in more or less the same findings. Differences were not as relevant as was expected considering the general tendencies of the past 60 years in Hungary. The change in the annual rate of forest recovery was 0.12%; settlements extended their area by an annual rate of 3.04%, while grasslands and arable lands had a net loss in their area within the studied period (0.60% and 0.89%, respectively). The kappa index showed a smaller similarity (~60%) between these dates but the fuzzy kappa and the aggregation index, taking into account both spatial and thematic errors, gave a more reliable result (~70–80% similarity). Landscape metrics on patch and class level ensured the possibility of a detailed analysis. We arrived at a similar outcome but were able to verify all the calculations through statistical tests. With this approach we were able to reveal significant (p < 0.05) changes; however, effect sizes did not show large magnitudes. Comparing the methods of revealing landscape change, the approach of landscape metrics was the most effective approach, as it was independent of spatial errors and ensuring a multiple way of interpretation.