Pharmacology, Toxicology and Environmental Health Commons^™

Prediction Of The Root Anchorage Of Native Young Plants Using Bayesian Inference, Ryan Wai Man Yan, Lin Zhang, Flora T. Y. Leung, Ka-Veng Yuen

Faculty of Design & Environment (THEi)

The maximum vertical uproot resistance (Pmax) of a plant can be used to indicate its stability. Attempts were made to predict the Pmax of a plant empirically from some of its size parameters. In practice, an infinite number of empirical models with different complexities can be formulated. This study presents a Bayesian model class selection method to evaluate the plausibility of each empirical model among a list of model candidates. The models were ranked to identify the most plausible one. A database of vertical uproot resistance of four shrubs and trees native to Hong Kong was first compiled by performing …