Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®

Life Sciences Commons

Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®

Articles 1 - 12 of 12

Full-Text Articles in Life Sciences

Using New And Long-Term Multi-Scale Remotely Sensed Data To Detect Recurrent Fires And Quantify Their Relationship To Land Cover/Use In Indonesian Peatlands, Yenni Vetrita Jan 2021

Using New And Long-Term Multi-Scale Remotely Sensed Data To Detect Recurrent Fires And Quantify Their Relationship To Land Cover/Use In Indonesian Peatlands, Yenni Vetrita

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Indonesia has committed to reducing its greenhouse gases emissions by 29% (potentially up to 41% with international assistance) by 2030. Achieving those targets requires many efforts but, in particular, controlling the fire problem in Indonesia’s peatlands is paramount, since it is unlikely to diminish on its own in the coming decades. This study was conducted in Sumatra and Kalimantan peatlands in Indonesia. Four MODIS-derived products (MCD45A1 collection 5.1, MCD64A1 (collection 5.1 and 6), FireCCI51) were initially assessed to explore long-term fire frequency and land use/cover change relationships. The results indicated the product(s) could only detect half of the fires accurately. …


Burning With Potential: Understanding The Relationship Between Biochar And Agriculture Of The Northern Glaciated Plains Ecoregion, Kaitlyn Abrahamson Jan 2020

Burning With Potential: Understanding The Relationship Between Biochar And Agriculture Of The Northern Glaciated Plains Ecoregion, Kaitlyn Abrahamson

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Achieving global sustainable agriculture is one of the most incredible challenges of this century, yet many continue to try to solve this problem through the development of precision technologies. Biotechnologies, such as biochar, can perform like a precision technology while protecting agricultural land from soil erosion and fertility loss. The Northern Glaciated Plains ecoregion of the United States is little researched in the benefits from the use of biochar through improved soil nutrient capture and water retention, crop health improvements, and yield increases. The study plot has four sections of corn stover biochar and eight sections of control sections. This …


Biophysical And Socioeconomic Impacts Of Farmer Managed Natural Regeneration In Burkina Faso, Basnewende Brice Fulgence Zoungrana Jan 2020

Biophysical And Socioeconomic Impacts Of Farmer Managed Natural Regeneration In Burkina Faso, Basnewende Brice Fulgence Zoungrana

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Human actions such as overgrazing, the development of cities at the expense of forests, high intensity and poor agricultural management, and so forth, reduce the resources available for future generations. Because Earth has limited resources, it is important to judiciously use and manage natural resources. Human actions towards nature are the focus of my research in Africa. Increased demands for grazing, agriculture, and ecosystem services led some farmers in developing countries to use unsustainable practices, which may lead to low incomes and poor food nutrition for households. Farmer managed natural regeneration (FMNR) may be a solution to these issues. FMNR …


Characterizing Spatiotemporal Patterns Of White Mold In Soybean Across South Dakota Using Remote Sensing, Confiance L. Mfuka Jan 2019

Characterizing Spatiotemporal Patterns Of White Mold In Soybean Across South Dakota Using Remote Sensing, Confiance L. Mfuka

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Soybean is among the most important crops, cultivated primarily for beans, which are used for food, feed, and biofuel. According to FAO, the United States was the biggest soybeans producer in 2016. The main soybean producing regions in the United States are the Corn Belt and the lower Mississippi Valley. Despite its importance, soybean production is reduced by several diseases, among which Sclerotinia stem rot, also known as white mold, a fungal disease that is caused by the fungus Sclerotinia sclerotiorum is among the top 10 soybean diseases. The disease may attack several plants and considerably reduce yield. According to …


Augmenting Land Cover/Land Use Classification By Incorporating Information From Land Surface Phenology: An Application To Quantify Recent Cropland Expansion In South Dakota, Lan Hoang Nguyen Jan 2019

Augmenting Land Cover/Land Use Classification By Incorporating Information From Land Surface Phenology: An Application To Quantify Recent Cropland Expansion In South Dakota, Lan Hoang Nguyen

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Understanding rapid land change in the U.S. NGP region is not only critical for management and conservation of prairie habitats and ecosystem services, but also for projecting production of crops and biofuels and the impacts of land conversion on water quality and rural transportation infrastructure. Hence, it raises the need for an LCLU dataset with good spatiotemporal coverage as well as consistent accuracy through time to enable change analysis. This dissertation aims (1) to develop a novel classification method, which utilizes time series images from comparable sensors, from the perspective of land surface phenology, and (2) to apply the land …


Vulnerability Of Protected Areas To Human Encroachment, Climate Change And Fire In The Fragmented Tropical Forests Of West Africa, Francis Kwabena Dwomoh Jan 2018

Vulnerability Of Protected Areas To Human Encroachment, Climate Change And Fire In The Fragmented Tropical Forests Of West Africa, Francis Kwabena Dwomoh

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The Upper Guinean region of West Africa is home to some of the most globally significant tropical biodiversity hotspots, providing ecosystem services that are crucial for the region’s socio-economic and environmental wellbeing. Nonetheless, following decades of human-caused destruction of natural habitats, protected areas currently remain the only significant refugia of original vegetation relics in landscapes that are highly fragmented. Aside from having strong geographic variation in land use, climate, vegetation, and human population, the region has also experienced remarkable biophysical and socio-economic changes in recent decades. All these factors influence the fire regime and the vulnerability of forests within protected …


Using Remote Sensing To Estimate Crop Water Use To Improve Irrigation Water Management, Arturo Reyes-Gonzalez Jan 2017

Using Remote Sensing To Estimate Crop Water Use To Improve Irrigation Water Management, Arturo Reyes-Gonzalez

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Irrigation water is scarce. Hence, accurate estimation of crop water use is necessary for proper irrigation managements and water conservation. Satellite-based remote sensing is a tool that can estimate crop water use efficiently. Several models have been developed to estimate crop water requirement or actual evapotranspiration (ETa) using remote sensing. One of them is the Mapping EvapoTranspiration at High Resolution using Internalized Calibration (METRIC) model. This model has been compared with other methods for ET estimations including weighing lysimeters, pan evaporation, Bowen Ratio Energy Balance System (BREBS), Eddy Covariance (EC), and sap flow. However, comparison of METRIC model outputs to …


A Comparison Of Land Use And Land Cover In Public Lands Of The Northwestern Great Plains And High Plains Ecoregions And The Implications For Grassland Birds, Dawn L. Siemonsma Jan 2017

A Comparison Of Land Use And Land Cover In Public Lands Of The Northwestern Great Plains And High Plains Ecoregions And The Implications For Grassland Birds, Dawn L. Siemonsma

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Loss and degradation of grassland habitat are driving forces that contribute to widespread declines of grassland birds in the United States. Many studies have evaluated habitat needs for the conservation of grassland birds, but the relative contribution of public lands in representing and maintaining avian biodiversity remains poorly understood. Having a better understanding of the role that publicly managed grasslands play in the conservation of grassland bird habitat is important for assessing the value of the investment the American public makes in these lands. Therefore, I investigated spatial relations among variations in amounts and distributions of publicly owned and managed …


Developing Management Guidelines That Balance Cattle And Timber Production With Ecological Interests In The Black Hills Of South Dakota, Kurt M. Chowanski Jan 2016

Developing Management Guidelines That Balance Cattle And Timber Production With Ecological Interests In The Black Hills Of South Dakota, Kurt M. Chowanski

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Forested lands contribute to the United States (US) economy by providing livestock and timber production. Livestock grazing of forested lands has been widespread throughout the western US since the settlement era, and currently occurs on 51.4 million hectares (ha) representing 16% of all US grazing land and 22% of all US forested land (Nickerson et al. 2011). While livestock grazing and timber harvest are occurring on a substantial amount of forested land, relationships between management practices, tree stocking, timber production, forage production, livestock grazing, wildlife, aesthetics, and ecological integrity are not well documented. Whether considering timber or cattle, finding a …


Fire Type Classification In The Brazilian Tropical Moist Forest Biome, Sanath Kumar Sathyachandran Jan 2014

Fire Type Classification In The Brazilian Tropical Moist Forest Biome, Sanath Kumar Sathyachandran

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The Brazilian Tropical Moist Forest Biome (BTMFB) is “Earth’s greatest biological treasure and a major component of the earth system” and forest degradation and deforestation by fire is a serious issue in this region. Fires in the BTMFB can be broadly classified as maintenance, deforestation and forest fire types. Spatially and temporally explicit information on the incidences of fire types are important as they have widely varying atmospheric emissions and ecological impacts. Satellite based remote sensing is a practical means of monitoring the BTMFB that spans almost 4 million km2. However, there has been no way to reliably …


Sagebrush Ecosystem Characterization, Monitoring, And Forecasting With Remote Sensing: Quantifying Future Climate And Wildlife Habitat Change, Collin G. Homer Jan 2013

Sagebrush Ecosystem Characterization, Monitoring, And Forecasting With Remote Sensing: Quantifying Future Climate And Wildlife Habitat Change, Collin G. Homer

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Sagebrush (Artemisia spp.) ecosystems constitute the largest single North American shrub ecosystem and provide vital ecological, hydrological, biological, agricultural, and recreational ecosystem services. Disturbances continue to alter this ecosystem, with climate change possibly representing the greatest future disturbance risk. Improved ways to characterize and monitor gradual change in this ecosystem are vital to its future management. A new remote sensing sagebrush characterization approach was developed in Wyoming which integrates three scales of remote sensing to derive four primary continuous field components (bare ground, herbaceousness, litter, and shrub), and four secondary components (sagebrush, big sagebrush, Wyoming sagebrush, and shrub …


Energy In The Corn Belt: Is Maize Production Sustainable?, Matthew Bernau Jan 2013

Energy In The Corn Belt: Is Maize Production Sustainable?, Matthew Bernau

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Technological and scientific innovation has transformed agricultural production. Corn production methods changed from a sustainable, nutrient recycling production system to one reliant on imported fossil energy inputs. Located in the Western Corn Belt, Union County, South Dakota was chosen as the study area. Changes in production methods are represented by four technological epochs: 1) The Draft Horse Epoch, 1890-1920; 2) The Tractor Epoch, 1920-1950; 3) The Fertilizer Epoch, 1950-1980; and 4) The Biotechnology and Precision Agriculture Epoch, 1980-2010. The energy budget method was used to measure the energy sustainability of corn production. The findings show that the volume of corn …