scholarly journals Spatial synchrony in vegetation response

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Haim Weissman ◽  
Yaron Michael ◽  
Nadav M. Shnerb

Spatial synchrony is ubiquitous in nature, and its decrease with the distance is an important feature that affects the viability of spatially structured populations. Here we present an empirical study of spatial synchrony in terrestrial vegetation using large scale remote sensing data. The decrease of synchrony with distance, as expressed by the correlation in rate of abundance change at a given time lag, is characterized using a power-law function with stretched-exponential cutoff. The range of these correlations appears to decrease when precipitation increases and to increase over time. The relevance of these results to the viability of populations is discussed.

2019 ◽  
Vol 221 ◽  
pp. 695-706 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jianbo Qi ◽  
Donghui Xie ◽  
Tiangang Yin ◽  
Guangjian Yan ◽  
Jean-Philippe Gastellu-Etchegorry ◽  
...  

Author(s):  
Houng Li

Stormwater management ponds are common best management practice (BMP) and green infrastructure (GI) for flood attenuation and water quality treatment in highway projects. Originally designed to provide storage volume for flood detention, stormwater ponds today often employ additional retention volume at pond bottom in a hope to improve water quality via sedimentation and other pollutant-removal mechanisms. It is commonly assumed that sediment accumulation and topographic variations (such as erosion, channelization, and in-pond plant growth and decay) over time often decrease the capacity of stormwater ponds. However, differences between design capacities and field capacities over time have never been verified and quantitatively analyzed before. This study presents such analysis using conventional topographic survey techniques and remote sensing data (topographic light detection and ranging digital elevation model [LIDAR DEM]) for 10 highway stormwater ponds along Interstate Highway-95 (I-95) systems in Baltimore City, Cecil County, and Harford County, Maryland, United States, with facility service life ranging from 14 to 26 years (1990–2015). Data derived from LIDAR DEM were compared with those from topographic survey; the LIDAR DEM data appear to be effective in measuring flood detention capacities and identifying silted ponds, but not in estimating the remaining retention volume for water quality treatment. Data from topographic survey indicate that the total volume in the ponds was relatively unchanged compared with the design, with increases in some instances. The increase typically occurred at the pond’s upper stages. Nonetheless, the water quality treatment capacity at pond bottom (wet pool volume) was drastically less (up to 100% of the design). As current maintenance practice of stormwater ponds relies heavily on visual inspection, the storage volume variations are often overlooked. As such, the findings prompt uncertainty on the long-term effectiveness of watershed implementation plan and models in the Chesapeake Bay watersheds, as many of them depend on wet pool volume design in BMP and GI.


RBRH ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 24 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hugo de Oliveira Fagundes ◽  
Fernando Mainardi Fan ◽  
Rodrigo Cauduro Dias de Paiva

ABSTRACT Calibration and validation are two important steps in the application of sediment models requiring observed data. This study aims to investigate the potential use of suspended sediment concentration (SSC), water quality and remote sensing data to calibrate and validate a large-scale sediment model. Observed data from across 108 stations located in the Doce River basin was used for the period between 1997-2010. Ten calibration and validation experiments using the MOCOM-UA optimization algorithm coupled with the MGB-SED model were carried out, which, over the same period of time, resulted in 37 calibration and 111 validation tests. The experiments were performed by modifying metrics, spatial discretization, observed data and parameters of the MOCOM-UA algorithm. Results generally demonstrated that the values of correlation presented slight variations and were superior in the calibration step. Additionally, increasing spatial discretization or establishing a background concentration for the model allowed for improved results. In a station with high quantity of SSC data, calibration improved the ENS coefficient from -0.44 to 0.44. The experiments showed that the spectral surface reflectance, total suspended solids and turbidity data have the potential to enhance the performance of sediment models.


2020 ◽  
Vol 12 (3) ◽  
pp. 530 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yang Han ◽  
Ziying Li ◽  
Chang Huang ◽  
Yuyu Zhou ◽  
Shengwei Zong ◽  
...  

Various drought indices have been developed to monitor drought conditions. Each index has typical characteristics that make it applicable to a specific environment. In this study, six popular drought indices, namely, precipitation condition index (PCI), temperature condition index (TCI), vegetation condition index (VCI), vegetation health index (VHI), scaled drought condition index (SDCI), and temperature–vegetation dryness index (TVDI), have been used to monitor droughts in the Greater Changbai Mountains(GCM) in recent years. The spatial pattern and temporal trend of droughts in this area in the period 2001–2018 were explored by calculating these indices from multi-source remote sensing data. Significant spatial–temporal variations were identified. The results of a slope analysis along with the F-statistic test showed that up to 20% of the study area showed a significant increasing or decreasing trend in drought. It was found that some drought indices cannot be explained by meteorological observations because of the time lag between meteorological drought and vegetation response. The drought condition and its changing pattern differ from various land cover types and indices, but the relative drought situation of different landforms is consistent among all indices. This work provides a basic reference for reasonably choosing drought indices for monitoring drought in the GCM to gain a better understanding of the ecosystem conditions and environment.


2020 ◽  
Vol 6 (3) ◽  
pp. 354-365
Author(s):  
Hannah J. White ◽  
Willson Gaul ◽  
Dinara Sadykova ◽  
Lupe León‐Sánchez ◽  
Paul Caplat ◽  
...  

2014 ◽  
Vol 128 ◽  
pp. 199-206 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jiaoyan Chen ◽  
Guozhou Zheng ◽  
Cong Fang ◽  
Ningyu Zhang ◽  
Huajun Chen ◽  
...  

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