scholarly journals High-Resolution Satellite Imagery to Assess Sargassum Inundation Impacts to Coastal Areas

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
William J. Hernandez ◽  
Julio M. Morell ◽  
Roy A. Armstrong

AbstractA change detection analysis utilizing Very High-resolution (VHR) satellite imagery was performed to evaluate the changes in benthic composition and coastal vegetation in La Parguera, southwestern Puerto Rico, attributable to the increased influx of pelagic Sargassum spp and its accumulations in cays, bays, inlets and near-shore environments. Satellite imagery was co-registered, corrected for atmospheric effects, and masked for water and land. A Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) and an unsupervised classification scheme were applied to the imagery to evaluate the changes in coastal vegetation and benthic composition. These products were used to calculate the differences from 2010 baseline imagery, to potential hurricane impacts (2018 image), and potential Sargassum impacts (2020 image). Results show a negative trend in Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) from 2010 to 2020 for the total pixel area of 24%, or 546,446 m2. These changes were also observed in true color images from 2010 to 2020. Changes in the NDVI negative values from 2018 to 2020 were higher, especially for the Isla Cueva site (97%) and were consistent with the field observations and drone surveys conducted since 2018 in the area. The major changes from 2018 and 2020 occurred mainly in unconsolidated sediments (e.g. sand, mud) and submerged aquatic vegetation (e.g. seagrass, algae), which can have similar spectra limiting the differentiation from multi-spectral imagery. Areas prone to Sargassum accumulation were identified using a combination of 2018 and 2020 true color VHR imagery and drone observations. This approach provides a quantifiable method to evaluate Sargassum impacts to the coastal vegetation and benthic composition using change detection of VHR images, and to separate these effects from other extreme events.

2020 ◽  
Vol 02 (03) ◽  
pp. 1-1
Author(s):  
Chris R. Lavers ◽  
◽  
Travis Mason ◽  
Jonathan Mazower ◽  
Sarah Grig ◽  
...  

High-resolution satellite imagery permits acquisition of critical data to observe climate-change and environmental impact on conflict-impacted indigenous communities with co-existing socio-economic factors, often within unstable regimes. Conflict may prevent direct access in remote regions to validate civilian conflict actor evidence. In such cases use of remote sensing tools, techniques, and data are extremely important. Software-based imagery assessment can quantify radiometrically calibrated or Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) and provide temporal changes with rapid detection over large search areas. In this work we evaluate recent trends in equatorial alpine glacier ablation to address the probability of indigenous water scarcity, as pure glacial water reserves are depleted near the Grasberg gold and copper mine in the Carstenz region, Western part of Papua Island, North of Oceania.


Atmosphere ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 11 (6) ◽  
pp. 613 ◽  
Author(s):  
Daniel Burow ◽  
Hannah V. Herrero ◽  
Kelsey N. Ellis

Remote sensing of tornado damage can provide valuable observations for post-event surveys and reconstructions. The tornadoes of 3 March 2019 in the southeastern United States are an ideal opportunity to relate high-resolution satellite imagery of damage with estimated wind speeds from post-event surveys, as well as with the Rankine vortex tornado wind field model. Of the spectral metrics tested, the strongest correlations with survey-estimated wind speeds are found using a Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI, used as a proxy for vegetation health) difference image and a principal components analysis emphasizing differences in red and blue band reflectance. NDVI-differenced values across the width of the EF-4 Beauregard-Smiths Station, Alabama, tornado path resemble the pattern of maximum ground-relative wind speeds across the width of the Rankine vortex model. Maximum damage sampled using these techniques occurred within 130 m of the tornado vortex center. The findings presented herein establish the utility of widely accessible Sentinel imagery, which is shown to have sufficient spatial resolution to make inferences about the intensity and dynamics of violent tornadoes occurring in vegetated areas.


2021 ◽  
Vol 64 (3) ◽  
pp. 879-891
Author(s):  
Sindhuja Sankaran ◽  
Afef Marzougui ◽  
J. Preston Hurst ◽  
Chongyuan Zhang ◽  
James C. Schnable ◽  
...  

HighlightsVegetation indices (NDVI, GNDVI, and SAVI) extracted from high-resolution satellite imagery were significantly associated with vegetation indices extracted from UAV imagery.High-resolution satellite data can be used to predict maize yield at breeding plot scale.Breeding plot sizes and the variability between maize genotypes may be associated with prediction accuracies.Abstract. The recent availability of high spatial and temporal resolution satellite imagery has widened its applications in agriculture. Plant breeding and genetics programs are currently adopting unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) based imagery data as a complement to ground data collection. With breeding trials across multiple geographic locations, UAV imaging is not always convenient. Hence, we anticipate that, similar to UAV imaging, phenotyping of individual test plots from high-resolution satellite imagery may also provide value to plant genetics and breeding programs. In this study, high spatial resolution satellite imagery (~38 to 48 cm pixel-1) was compared to imagery acquired using a UAV for its ability to phenotype maize grown in two-row and six-row breeding plots. Statistics (mean, median, sum) of color (red, green, blue), near-infrared, and vegetation indices such as normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI), green normalized difference vegetation index (GNDVI), and soil adjusted vegetation index (SAVI) were extracted from imagery from both sources (UAV and satellite) for comparison at three time points. In general, a strong correlation between satellite and UAV imagery extracted NDVI, GNDVI, and SAVI features (especially with mean and median statistics, p < 0.001) was observed at different time points. The correlation of both UAV and satellite image features with yield potential was maximum (p < 0.001) at the third time point (milk/dough growth stages). For example, Pearson’s correlation coefficients between mean NDVI, GNDVI, and SAVI features with yield potential were 0.52, 0.54, and 0.51 for data derived from UAV imagery, and 0.34, 0.41, and 0.40 for data derived from satellite imagery, respectively. Machine learning algorithms, including least absolute shrinkage and selection operator (Lasso) regression, were evaluated for yield prediction using vegetation index features that were significantly correlated with observed yield. The relationship between satellite imagery with crop performance can be a function of plot size in addition to crop variability. Nevertheless, with the ongoing improvement of satellite technologies, there is a possibility for the integration of satellite data into breeding programs, thus improving phenotyping efficiencies. Keywords: Image processing, Machine learning, Plant breeding, Statistical analysis, Unmanned aerial vehicles.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Brianna Pagán ◽  
Adekunle Ajayi ◽  
Mamadou Krouma ◽  
Jyotsna Budideti ◽  
Omar Tafsi

<p>The value of satellite imagery to monitor crop health in near-real time continues to exponentially grow as more missions are launched making data available at higher spatial and temporal scales. Yet cloud cover remains an issue for utilizing vegetation indexes (VIs) solely based on optic imagery, especially in certain regions and climates. Previous research has proven the ability to reconstruct VIs like the Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) and Leaf Area Index (LAI) by leveraging synthetic aperture radar (SAR) datasets, which are not inhibited by cloud cover. Publicly available data from SAR missions like Sentinel-1 at relatively decent spatial resolutions present the opportunity for more affordable options for agriculture users to integrate satellite imagery in their day to day operations. Previous research has successfully reconstructed optic VIs (i.e. from Sentinel-2) with SAR data (i.e. from Sentinel-1) leveraging various machine learning approaches for a limited number of crop types. However, these efforts normally train on individual pixels rather than leveraging information at a field level. </p><p>Here we present Beyond Cloud, a product which is the first to leverage computer vision and machine learning approaches in order to provide fused optic and SAR based crop health information. Field level learning is especially well-suited for inherently noisy SAR datasets. Several use cases are presented over agriculture fields located throughout the United Kingdom, France and Belgium, where cloud cover limits optic based solutions to as little as 2-3 images per growing season. Preliminary efforts for additional features to the product including automated crop and soil type detection are also discussed. Beyond Cloud can be accessed via a simple API which makes integration of the results easy for existing dashboards and smart-ag tools. Overall, these efforts promote the accessibility of satellite imagery for real agriculture end users.</p><p> </p>


2012 ◽  
Vol 23 (2) ◽  
pp. 139-172
Author(s):  
Abdullah Salman Alsalman Abdullah Salman Alsalman

Noting that Khartoum represents the most rapidly expanding city in the Sudan and taking into account that change detection operations are seldom , the present study has been initiated to attempt to produce work that synthesizes land use/land cover (LULC) to investigate change detection using GIS, remote sensing data and digital image processing techniques; estimate, evaluate and map changes that took place in the city from 1975 to 2003. The experiment used the techniques of visual inspection, write-function-memoryinsertion, image differencing, image transformation i.e. normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI), tasseled cap, principal component analysis (PCA), post-classification comparison and GIS. The results of all these various techniques were used by the authors to study change detection of the geographic locale of the test area. Image processing and GIS techniques were performed using Intergraph Image analyst 8.4 and GeoMedia professional version 6, ERDAS Imagine 8.7, and ArcGIS 9.2. Results obtained were discussed and analyzed in a comparative manner and a conclusion regarding the best method for change detection of the test area was derived.


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