Life Sciences Commons^™

Discrete Return Lidar-Based Prediction Of Leaf Area Index In Two Conifer Forests, Jennifer L.R. Jensen, Karen S. Humes, Lee A. Vierling, Andrew T. Hudak

USDA Forest Service / UNL Faculty Publications

Leaf area index (LAI) is a key forest structural characteristic that serves as a primary control for exchanges of mass and energy within a vegetated ecosystem. Most previous attempts to estimate LAI from remotely sensed data have relied on empirical relationships between field-measured observations and various spectral vegetation indices (SVIs) derived from optical imagery or the inversion of canopy radiative transfer models. However, as biomass within an ecosystem increases, accurate LAI estimates are difficult to quantify. Here we use lidar data in conjunction with SPOT5-derived spectral vegetation indices (SVIs) to examine the extent to which integration of both lidar and …