Estimation of forest leaf water content through inversion of a radiative transfer model from LiDAR and hyperspectral data

The accurate estimation of leaf water content (LWC) and knowledge about its spatial variation are important for forest and agricultural management since LWC provides key information for evaluating plant physiology. Hyperspectral data have been widely used to estimate LWC. However, the canopy reflectance can be affected by canopy structure, thereby introducing error to the retrieval of LWC from hyperspectral data alone. Radiative transfer models (RTM) provide a robust approach to combine LiDAR and hyperspectral data in order to address the confounding effects caused by the variation of canopy structure. In this study, the INFORM model was adjusted to retrieve LWC from airborne hyperspectral and LiDAR data. Two structural parameters (i.e. stem density and crown diameter) in the input of the INFORM model that affect canopy reflectance most were replaced by canopy cover which could be directly obtained from LiDAR data. The LiDAR-derived canopy cover was used to constrain in the inversion procedure to alleviate the ill-posed problem. The models were validated against field measurements obtained from 26 forest plots and then used to map LWC in the southern part of the Bavarian Forest National Park in Germany. The results show that with the introduction of prior information of canopy cover obtained from LiDAR data, LWC could be retrieved with a good accuracy (R² = 0.87, RMSE = 0.0022 g/cm², nRMSE = 0.13). The adjustment of the INFORM model facilitated the introduction of prior information over a large extent, as the estimation of canopy cover can be achieved from airborne LiDAR data.     

考虑开放度的树冠层辐射传输模型及实验验证

基于树冠层的结构特征,从方向间隙率定义了冠层中不同空间位置对天空散射入照的开放度及其在冠层中的分布,建立了入射辐射在冠层中的衰减与传输模型。应用对冠层结构、总入射辐射、辐射在冠层中衰减等的野外观测数据,对模型进行了验证。模型成功地解释了光在树冠层中辐射传输的变化规律。     

Modelling Vegetation-Atmosphere Co2 Exchange By A Coupled Eulerian-Langrangian Approach

A Eulerian-Lagrangian canopy microclimate model wasdeveloped with the aim of discerning physical frombiophysical controls of CO₂ and H₂O fluxes. The model couples radiation attenuation with mass,energy, and momentum exchange at different canopylevels. A unique feature of the model is its abilityto combine higher order Eulerian closure approachesthat compute velocity statistics with Lagrangianscalar dispersion approaches within the canopy volume. Explicit accounting for within-canopy CO₂,H₂O, and heat storage is resolved by consideringnon-steadiness in mean scalar concentration andtemperature. A seven-day experiment was conducted inAugust 1998 to investigate whether the proposedmodel can reproduce temporal evolution of scalar(CO₂, H₂O and heat) fluxes, sources andsinks, and concentration profiles within and above auniform 15-year old pine forest. The modelreproduced well the measured depth-averaged canopy surfacetemperature, CO₂ and H₂O concentrationprofiles within the canopy volume, CO₂ storageflux, net radiation above the canopy, and heat andmass fluxes above the canopy, as well as the velocitystatistics near the canopy-atmosphere interface. Implications for scaling measured leaf-levelbiophysical functions to ecosystem scale are alsodiscussed.     

The Influence of Local Stability on Heat and Momentum Transfer within Open Canopies

Eddy-covariance data have been analyzed to investigate the influence of local stability on heat transfer within open canopies. The flux–gradient relationship for heat is derived from the temperature variance equation, and the stability dependence of the flux–gradient relationship is examined and discussed. The results indicate that the strong stability dependence of the nondimensional standard deviation of temperature, and the small contributions of turbulent transport to the temperature variance, lead to a strong stability dependence of the nondimensional temperature gradient within open canopies. Quadrant analysis and hole size analysis were performed for momentum and heat fluxes in the subcanopy, and the results indicate that the contribution of each quadrant to the total flux depends on both the local stability and canopy depth. The intermittency of the turbulent flux does not show a clear dependence on local stability. As the contribution of ejections to the heat flux increases, the vertical flux of the temperature variance changes sign from negative to positive, leading to small temperature variance transport in unstable conditions. Multi-resolution analysis indicates that heat and momentum are transported with different dominant time scales in very unstable conditions, suggesting a different role of local buoyancy in heat and momentum transfer.     

Spatial Variability of Both Turbulent Fluxes and Temperature Profiles in an Urban Roughness Layer

The spatial variability of both turbulent flow statistics in the roughness sublayer (RSL) and temperature profiles within and above the canopy layer (CL) were investigated experimentally in a densely built-up residential area in Tokyo, Japan. Using five towers with measuring devices, each tower isolated from the others by at least 200 m, we collected high-frequency measurements of velocity and temperature at a height z=1.8 z _H, where z _H, the mean building height in the area, is 7.3 m. Also, temperature profiles were measured from z=0.4 to 1.8 z _H. The ‘areal mean’ geometric parameters that were obtained for the areas within 200 m of each tower were fairly homogeneous among the tower sites. The main results are as follows: (1) The spatial variability of all RSL turbulent statistics, except the sensible heat flux, was comparable to that reported in a pine forest. Also, the variability decreased with increasing friction velocity. (2) The spatial variability of the RSL sensible heat flux was larger than that reported in a pine forest. Also, the variability depended on the time of the day and became larger in the morning. The difference among the sites was well related to the areal fraction of vegetation. (3) The spatial variability of the CL temperature profile depended on the time of the day and became larger in the morning. Nevertheless, the spatial standard deviation of CL temperature was always below 0.7 K. (4) It is suggested that the “warming-up” process in the morning when heat storage is dominant increases the spatial variation of RSL sensible heat flux and CL temperature according to the local properties around each tower and the variation decreases once there is further convective mixing in the midday     

影响植被内部辐射状况的冠层结构特征研究

植被冠层结构特征是影响植被内部辐射状况的重要因子之一,对于植被群体的光合特性来说,冠层结构特性影响了光合有效辐射的截获、吸收和透射。本文着重分析了冠层结构的数量特征（如叶面积指数）和冠层几何结构特征,综合考虑叶倾角、叶方位角和Ｇ函数等群体几何特征,以便直接用于遥感光合植被生物量机理估测模型的建立。     

The spatial pattern of grasses in relation to tree effects in an arid savanna community: Inferring the relative importance of canopy and root effect

Both aboveground and belowground processes play important roles in tree-grass interactions in savannas. Little consideration has been given to within-site heterogeneity in the strengths of co-occurring canopy and root effects of trees on grasses in savanna communities. Here, we attempted to correlate the spatial pattern of grass morphological traits with the strengths of canopy and root effects. The results from a spatial analysis suggested that the grass traits had lower variability within the operating domain of the root effect than within that of the canopy effect in sub-canopy areas; in contrast, the operating domain of the root effect presented higher variability of grass traits than that of the canopy effect in inter-canopy areas. Combined with root investigations on vertical distribution patterns, these results suggested that the root effect appeared to outweigh the canopy effect in the sub-canopy areas, where apparent vertical root separation between trees and grasses was shown; while the canopy effect could outweigh the root effect in the inter-canopy areas, where root separation was not observed. This study could provide correlative information on the relative importance of canopy and root effects, and has some useful implications on within-site heterogeneity in terms of aboveground and belowground components in savannas.     

Spectral Short-circuiting and Wake Production within the Canopy Trunk Space of an Alpine Hardwood Forest

Using synchronous multi-level high frequency velocity measurements, the turbulence spectra within the trunk space of an alpine hardwood forest were analysed. The spectral short-circuiting of the energy cascade for each velocity component was well reproduced by a simplified spectral model that retained return-to-isotropy and component-wise work done by turbulence against the drag and wake production. However, the use of an anisotropic drag coefficient was necessary to reproduce these measured component-wise spectra. The degree of anisotropy in the vertical drag was shown to vary with the element Reynolds number. The wake production frequency in the measured spectra was shown to be consistent with the vortex shedding frequency at constant Strouhal number given by f _vs = 0.21ū/d, where d can be related to the stem diameter at breast height (dbh) and ū is the local mean velocity. The energetic scales, determined from the inflection point instability at the canopy–atmosphere interface, appear to persist into the trunk space when , where C _du is the longitudinal drag coefficient, a _cr is the crown-layer leaf area density, h _c is the canopy height, and β is the dimensionless momentum absorption at the canopy top.     

Errors in LiDAR-derived shrub height and crown area on sloped terrain

This study developed and tested four methods for shrub height measurements with airborne LiDAR data in a semiarid shrub-steppe in southwestern Idaho, USA. Unique to this study was the focus of sagebrush height measurements on sloped terrain. The study also developed one of the first methods towards estimating crown area of sagebrush from LiDAR. Both sagebrush height and crown area were underestimated by LiDAR. Sagebrush height was estimated to within ± 0.26-0.32 mm (two standard deviations of standard error). Crown area was underestimated by a mean of 49%. Further, hillslope had a relatively low impact on sagebrush height and crown area estimation. From a management perspective, estimation of individual shrubs over large geographic areas can be accomplished using a 0.5 m rasterized vegetation height derivative from LiDAR. While the underestimation of crown area is substantial, we suggest that this underestimation would improve with higher LiDAR point density (>4 points/m²). Further studies can estimate shrub biomass using LiDAR height and crown area derivatives.     

植被冠层截留对地表水分和能量平衡影响的数值模拟

利用NCAR_CLM4.0模式,通过有无植被冠层截留的试验对比分析,讨论了植被冠层截留对全球陆面水分和能量平衡产生的潜在影响.结果表明:就全球水分平衡而言,不考虑植被冠层截留时,全球平均土壤总含水量、表面径流和次表面径流增加,蒸散发减少.空间分布特征表明,低纬地区各水分平衡分量全年维持较高的差值分布,并随季节变化沿赤道南北振荡;北半球中高纬高值区有春季扩张、夏季极盛、秋冬季撤退的趋势.冠层截留消失后冠层蒸发的消失是蒸散发减弱的主要原因.对于能量平衡而言,不考虑冠层截留时,全球感热通量增加,冠层感热的增加明显大于地面感热的减少;潜热减少.此外,不同植被类型对不考虑冠层截留后产生的响应存在明显差异.