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ID: 61102
Title: Geostatistical modeling using LiDAR-derived prior knowledge with SPOT-6 data to estimate temperate forest canopy cover and above-ground biomass via stratified random sampling.
Author: Wang Li, Zheng Niu, Xinlian Liang, Zengyuan Li, Ni Huang, Shuai Gao, Cheng Wang, Shakir Muhammad.
Editor: F.D.van der Meer
Year: 2015
Publisher: Elsevier B.V.
Source: Centre for Ecological Sciences
Reference: APPLIED EARTH OBSERVATION AND GEOINFORMATION. Vol. 41 88-98 (2015).
Subject: APPLIED EARTH OBSERVATION AND GEOINFORMATION.
Keywords: Geostatistical modeling, LiDAR, SPOT-6, Canopy cover, Above-ground biomass.
Abstract: Forest canopy cover (CC) and above-ground biomass (AGB) is important ecological indicators for forest monitoring and geoscience applications. This study aimed to estimate temperate forest CC and AGB by integrating airborne LiDAR data with wall-to wall space-borne SPOT-6 data through geospatial modeling. Our study involved the following approach: (1) reference maps of CC and AGB were derived from wall-to-wall LiDAR data and calibrated by field measurements; (2) twelve discrete LiDAR fights were simulated by assuming that LiDAR data were only available beneath these flights; (3) training/testing samples of CC and AGB were extracted from the reference maps inside and outside the simulated flights using stratified random sampling; (4) The simple linear regression, ordinary kriging and regression kriging model were used to extend the sparsely sampled CC/AGB data to entire study area by incorporating a selection of SPOT-6 variables, including vegetation indices and texture variables. The regression kriging model was superior at estimating and mapping the spatial distribution of CC and AGB, respectively) and root mean squared error (RMSE; 17.361 % and 21.351 t/ha for CC and AGB, respectively). And root mean squared error (RMSE; 17.361 % and 21.351 t/ha for CC and AGB, respectively). The predicted and reference values of both CC and AGB were highly correlated for the entire study are based on the estimation histograms and error maps. Finally, we concluded that the regression kriging model was superior and more effective at estimating LiDAR-derived CC and AGB values using the spatially-reduced samples and the SPOT-6 variables. The presented modeling workflow will greatly facilitate future forest growth monitoring and carbon stock assessments for large areas of temperate forest in northeast China. It also provides guidance on how to take full advantage of future sparsely collected LiDAR data in cases where wall-to-wall LiDAR coverage is not available from the perspective of geostatistics.
Location: T E 15 New Biology Building.
Literature cited 1: Adjorlolo, C., Mutanga, O., 2013.Integrating remote sensing and geostatistics to estimate woody vegetation in an African savanna.J.Spat.Sci.58, 305-322. Andersen, H.E., McGaughey, R.J., Reutebuch, S.E, 2005.Estimating forest canopy fuel parameters using LiDAR data. Remote Sens.Environ.94 (4), 441-449.
Literature cited 2: Ahmed, R., Siqueira, P., Hensley, S., 2013. A study of forest biomass estimates from lidar in the northern temperate forests of New England. Remote Sens.Environ. 130, 121-135. Atkinson, P.M., Webster, R., Curran, P.J., 1992. Cokriging with ground-based radiometry. Remote Sens.Environ.50, 335-345.

ID: 61101
Title: Classification of vegetation in an open landscape using full-waveform airborne laser scanner data.
Author: Cici Alexander, Balazs Deak, Adam Kania, Werner Mucke, Hermann Heilmeier.
Editor: F.D.van der Meer
Year: 2015
Publisher: Elsevier B.V.
Source: Centre for Ecological Sciences
Reference: APPLIED EARTH OBSERVATION AND GEOINFORMATION. Vol. 41 76-87 (2015).
Subject: APPLIED EARTH OBSERVATION AND GEOINFORMATION.
Keywords: LiDAR, Habitat mapping, Grasslands, Natura 2000, Micro-topography.
Abstract: Airborne laser scanning (ALS) is increasingly being used for the mapping of vegetation, although the focus so far has been on woody vegetation, and ALS data have only rarely been used for the classification of grassland vegetation. In this study, we classified the vegetation of an open alkali landscape, characterezied by two Natura 2000 habitat types: Pannonic salt steppes and salt marshes and pannonic loess steppic grasslands. We generated 18 variables from an ALS dataset collected in the growing (leaf-on) season. Elevation is a key factor determining the patterns of vegetation types in the landscape, and hence 3 additional variables were based on a digital terrain model (DTM) generated from an ALS dataset collected in the dormant (leaf-off) season. We classified the vegetation into 24 classes based on these 21 variables, at a pixel size of 1m. Two groups of variables with and without the DTM-based variables were used in a Random Forest classifier, to estimate the influence of elevation, on the accuracy of the classification. The resulting classes at Level 4, based on associations, were aggregatd at three levels-Levels 3 (11 classes), Level 2 (8 classes) and Level 1 (5 classes)-based on species pool, site conditions and structure, and the accuracies were assessed. The classes were also aggregated based on Natura 2000 habitat types to assess the accuracy of the classification, and its usefulness for the monitoring of habitat quality. The vegetation could be classified into dry grasslands, wetlands, weeds, woody species and man-made features, at level 1 and 2 provide suitable information for nature conservationists and land managers, while Levels 3 and 4 are especially useful for ecologists, geologists and soil scientists as they provide high resolution data on species distribution, vegetation patterns, soil properties and their correlations. Including the DTM-based variables increased the accuracy (k) from 0.73 to 0.79 for Level 1. These findings show that the structural spectral attributes of ALS echoes can be used for the classification of open landscapes, especially those where vegetation is influenced by elevation, such as coastal salt marshes, sand dunes, karst or alluvial areas; in these cases, ALS has a distinct advantage over other remotely sensed data.
Location: T E 15 New Biology Building.
Literature cited 1: Ackermann, F., 1999. Airborne laser scanning-present status and future expectations.ISPRS J.Photogramm.Remote Sens.54, 64-67. Alonzo, M., Bookhagen, B., Roberts, D.A., 2014. Urban trees species mapping using hyperspectral and lidar data fusion. Remote Sens.Environ. 148, 70-83.
Literature cited 2: Barbault, R., 2013. Loss of biodiversity, overview. In: Levin, S.A. (Ed.), Encyclopedia of Biodiversity.2nd Ed. Academic Press, Waltham, pp. 656-666. Blair, J.B., Rabine, D.L., Hofton, M.A., 1999. The laser vegetation imaging sensor: a medium-altitude, digitization-only, airborne laser altimeter for mapping vegetation and topography.ISPRSJ.Photogramm.Remote Sens. 54 (2-3), 115-122.

ID: 61100
Title: Detecting the changes in rural communities in Taiwan by applying multiphase segmentation on FORMOSA-2 satellite imagery.
Author: Yishuo Huang
Editor: F.D.van der Meer
Year: 2015
Publisher: Elsevier B.V.
Source: Centre for Ecological Sciences
Reference: APPLIED EARTH OBSERVATION AND GEOINFORMATION. Vol. 41 56-75 (2015).
Subject: APPLIED EARTH OBSERVATION AND GEOINFORMATION.
Keywords: Change Detection, NDVI, Image Segmentation.
Abstract: Agricultural activities mainly occur in rural areas; recently, ecological conservation and biological diversity are being emphasized in rural communities to promote sustainable development for rural communities, especially for rural communities in Taiwan. Therefore, since 2005, many rural communities in Taiwan have compiled their own development strategies in order to create their own unique characteristics to attract people to visit and stay in rural communities. By implementing these strategies, young people can stay in their own rural communities and the rural communities are rejuvenated. However, some rural communities introduce artificial construction in to the community such that the ecological and biological environments are significantly degraded. The strategies need to be efficiently monitored because up to 67 rural communities have proposed rejuvenation projects. In 2015, up to 440 rural communities were estimated to be involved in rural community rejuvenations. How to monitor the changes occurring in those rural communities participating in rural community rejuvenation such that ecological conservation and ecological diversity can be satisfied is an important issue in rural community management. Remote sensing provides an efficient and rapid method to achieve this issue. Segmentation plays a fundamental role in human perception. In this respect, segmentation can be used as the process of transforming the collection of pixels of an image into a group of regions or objects with meaning. This paper proposed an algorithm based on the multiphase approach to segment the normalized difference vegetation index, NDVI, of the rural communities in to several sub-regions, and to have the NDVI distribution in each sub-region be homogeneous. Those regions whose values of NDVI are close will be merged in to the same class. In doing so, a complex NDVI map can be simplified into two groups: the high and low values of NDVI. The class with low NDVI values corresponds to those regions containing roads, buildings, and other manmade construction works and the class with high values of NDVI indicates that those regions contain vegetation in good health. In order to verify the processed results, the regional boundaries were extracted and laid down on the given images to check whether the extracted boundaries were laid down on buildings, roads, or other artificial constructions. In addition to the proposed approach, another approach called statistical region merging was employed by grouping sets of pixels with homogeneous properties such that those sets are iteratively grown by combining smaller regions or pixels. In doing so, the segmented NDVI map can be generated. By comparing the areas of the merged classes in different years, the changes occurring in the rural communities of Taiwan can be detected. The satellite imagery of FORMOSA-2 with 2-m ground resolution is employed to evaluate the performance of the proposed approach. The satellite imagery of two rural communities (Jhumen and Taomi communities) is chosen to evaluate environmental changes between 2005 and 2010. The change maps of 2005-2010 show that a high density of green on a patch of land is increased by 19.62 ha in Jhumen community and conversely a similar patch of land is significantly decreased by 236.59 ha in Taomi community. Furthermore, the change maps created by another image segmentation method is called statistical region merging generate similar processed results to multiphase segmentation.
Location: T E 15 New Biology Building.
Literature cited 1: Berstimas, D., Tsitsiklis, J., 1993. Simulated annealing.Stat.Sci.Vol. (8), 10-15. Bruzzone, L., Prieto, D.F., 2002. An adaptive semiparametric and context-based approach to unsupervised change detection in multitemporal remote-sensing images. IEEE Trans Process.Vol. 11 (4), 452-466.
Literature cited 2: Bruzzone, L., Serpico, S.B., 1997. An iterative technique for the detection of land-cover transitions in multitemporal remote-sensing images. IEEE Trans. Geosci.Remote Sens.vol. 35 (4), 858-867. Chan, T., Vese, L., 2001. Active contour without edge.IEEE Trans.Image Process. Vol.10 (2), 266-277.

ID: 61099
Title: Measures of spatio-temporal accuracy for time series land cover data
Author: Narumasa Tsutsumida, Alexis J.Comber.
Editor: F.D.van der Meer
Year: 2015
Publisher: Elsevier B.V.
Source: Centre for Ecological Sciences
Reference: APPLIED EARTH OBSERVATION AND GEOINFORMATION. Vol. 41 46-55 (2015).
Subject: APPLIED EARTH OBSERVATION AND GEOINFORMATION.
Keywords: Remotely sensed data, Spatio-temporal analysis, Accuracy assessment, Geographically weighted model, Principal component analysis.
Abstract: Remote sensing is a useful tool for monitoring changes in land cover over time. The accuracy of such time-series analyses has hitherto only seen assessed using confusion matrices. The matrix allows global measures of user, producer and overall accuracies to be generated, but lacks consideration of any spatial aspects of accuracy. It is well known that land cover errors are typically spatially auto-correlated and can have a distinct spatial distribution. As yet little work has considered the temporal dimension and investigated the persistence or errors in both geographic and temporal dimensions. Spatio-temporal errors can have a profound impact on both change detection and on environmental monitoring and modeling activities using land cover data. This study investigated methods for describing the spatio-temporal characteristics of classification accuracy. Annual thematic maps were created using a random forest classification of MODIS data over the Jakarta metropolitan areas for the period of 2001-2013.A logistic geographically weighted model was used to estimate annual spatial measures of user, producer and overall accuracies. A principal component analysis was then used to extract summaries of the multi-temporal accuracy. The results showed how the spatial distribution of user and producer accuracy varied over space and time, and overall spatial variance was confirmed by the principal component analysis. The results indicated that areas of homogeneous land cover were mapped with relatively high accuracy and low variability, and areas of mixed land cover with the opposite characteristics. A multi-temporal spatial approach to accuracy is shown to provide more informative measures of accuracy, allowing map producers and users to evaluate time series thematic maps more comprehensively than a standard confusion matrix approach. The needs to identify suitable properties for a temporal kernel are discussed.
Location: T E 15 New Biology Building.
Literature cited 1: Bayarsaikhan, U., Boldgiv, B., Kim, K-R, Park, K.-A, Lee, D., 2009. Change detection and classification of land cover at Hustai National Park in Mongolia.Int.J.Appl. Earth Observ.Geoinf.11 (4), 273-280 http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jag.2009.03.004. Breiman, L., 2001. Random forests.Mach.Learn.45 (1), 5-32, http://dx.doi.org/10.1023/A.1010933404324.
Literature cited 2: Brunsdon, C., Fotheringham, A.S., Charlton, M.E., 1996. Geographically weightedregression: a method for exploring spatial nonstationarity.Geog.Anal.28 (4), 281-298,http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1538-4632.1996.tb00936.x. Budiyono, Y., Aerts, J., Brinkman, J., Marfai, M.A., Ward, P., 2014.Flood risk assessment for delta mega-cities: a case study of Jakarta.Nat.Hazards, 389-413, http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s11069-014-1327-9.

ID: 61098
Title: Detection of dryland degradation using Landsat spectral unmixing remote sensing with syndrome concept in Minqin County, China.
Author: Danfeng Sun.
Editor: F.D.van der Meer
Year: 2015
Publisher: Elsevier B.V.
Source: Centre for Ecological Sciences
Reference: APPLIED EARTH OBSERVATION AND GEOINFORMATION. Vol. 41 34-45 (2015).
Subject: APPLIED EARTH OBSERVATION AND GEOINFORMATION.
Keywords: Linear spectral mixture analysis, Change detection, Syndrome, Dryland system, Western China.
Abstract: This study was to detect dryland degradation coupling linear spectral unmixing model of Landsat images with syndrome concept in temperate drylandsystem, Minqin, China. The phonological contrast and complementation between green vegetation fraction in summer, sandland fraction and saline land fraction in spring, was firstly structured to quantify degradation characteristics by simple correlation analysis with ground data. The spatiotemporal patterns of the three degradation indicators were interpreted with the help ?dust bowl? syndrome, quantitatively deciphered the degradation causal clusters, loops and important consequences in the study area. The results indicate water-using and distribution pattern was changed, agricultural intensity and productivity increased, salinization lessened in oasis, whereas sandification risk heightened. This approach developed in this study, has the potentially broad applicability, for dryland system monitoring and modelling.
Location: T E 15 New Biology Building.
Literature cited 1: Adams, J.B., Sabol, D.E., Kapos, V., Filho, R.A., Roberts, D.A., Smith, M.O.,Gillespie, A.R., 1995.Classification of multispectral images based on fraction of endmembers: application to land-cover change in the Brazilian Amazon. Remote Sens.Environ.52, 137-154. Camacho-De Coca, F., Garcia-haro, F.J., Gilabert, M.A., Melia, J., 2004. Vegetation cover seasonal changes assessment from TM imagery in a semi-arid landscape. Int.J.Remote Sens.25, 3451-3476.
Literature cited 2: Chasek, P., Safriel, U., Shikongo, S., Fuhrman, V.F., 2015.Operationalizing zero net land degradation: the next stage in international efforts to combat desertification? J.Arid Environ.112, 5-13. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jaridenv.2014.05.020 Dawelbait, M., Morari, F., 2012.Monitoring desertification in a Savannah region in Sudan using Landsat images and spectral mixture analysis.J.Arid Environ.80, 45-55.

ID: 61097
Title: Drought monitoring and analysis in China based on the integrated Surface Drought Index (ISDI)
Author: Jianjun Wu, Lei Zhou, Xinyu Mo, Hongkui Zhou, Jie Zhang, Ruijing Jia.
Editor: F.D.van der Meer
Year: 2015
Publisher: Elsevier B.V.
Source: Centre for Ecological Sciences
Reference: APPLIED EARTH OBSERVATION AND GEOINFORMATION. Vol. 41 22-33 (2015).
Subject: APPLIED EARTH OBSERVATION AND GEOINFORMATION.
Keywords: Drought monitoring, ISDI, Remote sensing, MODIS, Data mining.
Abstract: Timely and accurate monitoring of the onset and evolution of drought in China are important to reduce losses from drought. The integrated Surface Drought Index (ISDI) which originally established in Mideast China shows a large potential for real-time regional drought monitoring. However, ISDI is still at the developmental stage, and the applicability of the index requires further examination especially for China with vast area, climatic conditions, complex topography, and land cover. Furthermore, ISDI model depends on the historical training data corresponding to the study area. ISDI application in China must be remodeled using the historical training data corresponding to the study area. In this paper, we remodeled ISDI over China based on previous work and evaluated its capability for near real-time drought monitoring. Using the Palmer Drought Severity Index (PDSI) as a dependent variable, ISDI integrates climate-based drought indices, satellite-based Vegetation Index (VI) and land surface temperature (LST) with other biophysical and elevation data to produce a 1-km regional drought condition map at 16-day intervals. Strong relationships were determined between the calculated ISDI results demonstrated a good performance for monitoring droughts in southwestern China from 2009 to 2010, high temperatures and droughts in southern China in 2013, and floods in northeastern China in 2013. The higher spatial resolution and near real-time capability of ISDI can provide important inputs for drought management and mitigation in China.
Location: T E 15 New Biology Building.
Literature cited 1: AghaKouchak, A., 2015.Amultivariate approaches for persistence-based drought prediction: application to the 2010-2011 East Africa drought.J.Hydrol, http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.hydrol.2014.09.063. Belayneh, A., Adamowski, J., Khalil, B., Ozga-Zielinski, B., 2014. Long-term SPI drought forecasting in the Awash River Basin in Ethiopia using wavelet neural network and wavelet support vector regression models.J.Hydrol.508, 418-429.
Literature cited 2: Brown, J., Wardlow, B., Tadesse, T., Hayes, M., Reed, B., 2008.The Vegetation Drought Response Index (VegDRI): a new integrated approach for monitoring drought stress in vegetation.GLSci.Remote Sens.45, 16-46. Dogan, S., Berktay, A., Singh, V.P., 2012. Comparison of multi-monthly rainfall-based drought severity indices, with application to semi-arid Konya Closed basin, Turkey.J.Hydrol.470-471, 255-268.

ID: 61096
Title: Impact of the spatial resolution of climatic data and soil physical properties on regional corn yield predictions using the STICS crop model.
Author: Guillaume Jego, Elizabeth Pattey, S. Morteza Mesbah, Jiangui Liu, Isabelle Duchesne.
Editor: F.D.van der Meer
Year: 2015
Publisher: Elsevier B.V.
Source: Centre for Ecological Sciences
Reference: APPLIED EARTH OBSERVATION AND GEOINFORMATION. Vol. 41 11-22 (2015).
Subject: APPLIED EARTH OBSERVATION AND GEOINFORMATION.
Keywords: Earth observation, Rainfed corn, High pedodiversity, Leaf area index, Yield prediction, Abundant rainfall.
Abstract: The assimilation of Earth observation (EO) data into crop models has proven to be an efficient way to improve yield prediction at a regional scale by estimating key unknown crop management practices. However, the efficiency of prediction depends on the uncertainty associated with the data provided to crop models, particularly climatic data and soil physical properties. In this study, the performance of the STICS (Simulateur mul TIdisciplinaire pour les Cultures Standard) crop model for predicting corn yield after assimilation of leaf area index derived from EO data was evaluated under different scenarios. The scenarios were designed to examine the impact of using fine-resolution soil physical properties, as well as the impact of using climatic data from either one or four weather stations across the region of interest. The results indicate that when only one weather station was used, the average annual yield by producer was predicted well (absolute error < 5%), but the spatial variability lacked accuracy (root mean square error=1.3 t ha-1). The model root mean square error for yield prediction was highly correlated with the distance between the weather stations and the fields, for distances smaller than 10 km, and reached 0.5 t ha-1 for a 5-km distance when fine-resolution soil properties were used. When four weather stations were used, no significant improvement in model performance was observed. This was because of a marginal decrease (30 %) in the average distance fields and weather stations (from 10 to 7 km). However, the yield predictions were improved approximately 15 % with fine-resolution soil properties regardless of the number of weather stations used. The impact of the uncertainty associated with the EO-derived soil textures and the impact of alterations in rainfall distribution were also evaluated. A variation of about 10 % in any of the soil physical textures resulted in a change in dry yield of 0.4 t ha-1. Changes in rainfall distribution between two abundant rainfalls during the growing season led to a significant change in yield (0.5 t ha-1 on average). Our results highlight the importance of using fine-resolution gridded daily precipitation data to capture spatial variations of rainfall as well as using fine-resolution soil properties instead of coarse-resolution soil properties from the Canadian soil dataset, especially for regions with high pedodiversity.
Location: T E 15 New Biology Building.
Literature cited 1: Arrouays, D., Grundy, M.G., Hatermink, A.E., Hempel, J.W., Heuvelink, G.B.M., Hong, S.Y., Lagacherie, P.,Lelyk, G., McBratney, A.B., McKenzie, A.J., Mendonca-Santos d, M.L., Minasny, B., Montanarella, L., Odeh, I.O.A., Sanchez, P.A., Thompson, J.A., Zhang, G.-L., 2014.Chapter three-globalsoilmap:toward a fine-resolution global grid of soil properties.Adv.Agron.125, 93-134. Baret, F., Guyot, G., 1991. Potential and limits of vegetation indices for LAI and APAR assessment. Remote Sens.Environ.35, 161-173.
Literature cited 2: Barnes, E.M., Pinter Jr, P.J., Kimball, B.A., Wall, G.W.,LaMorte, R.L., Hunsaker, D.J., Adamsen, F., Leavitt, S., Thompson, T., Mathius, J., 1997.Modification CERES-wheat to accept leaf area index as an input variable. Paper No.973016.Am.Soc.Agric.Eng.St.Joseph, Mi, USA. Brisson, N., Mary, B., Ripoche, D., Jeuffroy, M.H., Ruget, F., Nicoullaud, B., Gate, P., Devienne-Barret, F., Antonioletti, R., Durr, C., Richard, G., Beaudoin, N., Recous, S., Tayot, X., Plenet, D., Cellier, P., Machet, J.-M, Meynard, J.M., Delecolle, R., 1998. STICS: a generic model for the simulation of crops and their water and nitrogen balances: 1. Theory and parameterization applied to wheat and corn. Agronomie 18, 311-346.

ID: 61095
Title: Land use intensity trajectories on Amazonian pastures derived from Landsat time series.
Author: Philippe Rufin, Hannes Muller, Dirk Pflugmacher, Patrick Hostert.
Editor: F.D.van der Meer
Year: 2015
Publisher: Elsevier B.V.
Source: Centre for Ecological Sciences
Reference: APPLIED EARTH OBSERVATION AND GEOINFORMATION. Vol. 41 1-10 (2015).
Subject: APPLIED EARTH OBSERVATION AND GEOINFORMATION.
Keywords: Land use intensity, vegetation dynamics, Phenology, Amazon Pastures, Landsat, Time series.
Abstract: Monitoring changes in land use intensity of grazing systems in the Amazon is an important prerequisite to study the complex political and socio-economic forces driving Amzonian deforestation. Remote sensing offers the potential to map pasture vegetation over large areas, but mapping pasture conditions consistently through time is not a trivial task because of seasonal changes associated with phenology and data gaps from clouds and cloud shadows. In this study, we tested spectral-temporal metrics derived from intra-annual Landsat time series to distinguish between grass-dominated and woody pastures. The abundance of woody vegetation on pastures is an indicator for management intensity trajectories between 1985 and 2012 in Novo Progresso, Brazil, finding that woody vegetation cover generally decreased after four to ten years of grazing activity. Pastures established in the 80s and early 90s showed a higher fraction of woody vegetation during their initial landuse history that pastures established in the early 2000s. Historic intensity trajectories suggested a trend towards more intensive land use in the last decade, which aligns well with regional environmental policies and market dynamics. This study demonstrates the potential of dense Landsat time series to monitor land-use intensification on Amazonian pastures.
Location: T E 15 New Biology Building.
Literature cited 1: Almeida, C.A., Pinheiro, T.F., Barbosa, A.M., Abreu, M.R., Lobo, F.L., Silva, M., Gomes, A.R., Sadeck, L.W., Medeiros, L.T., Neves, M.F., Silva, L.C., Tamasaukas, P.F., 2009. Metodologia para mapeamento de vegetacao secundaria na Amazonia legal.Sao Jose dos Campos.http:/urlib.net/8JMKD3MGP7W/36F3Q92 Alves, D., Soares, J., Amaral, S., Mello, E., Almeida, S., Da Silva, O., Silveira, A., 1997. Biomass of primary and secondary vegetation in Rondonia, Western Brazilian Amazon.Glob.Change Biol.3, 451-461.
Literature cited 2: Alves, D.S., Escada, M.I.S., Pereira, J.L.G., de Albuquerque Linhares, C., 203. Land use intensification and abandonment in Rondonia, Brazilian Amazonia.Int.J.Remote Sens.24 (4), 899-903. Asner, G.P., Elmore, A.J., Olander, L.P., Martin, R.E., Harris, A.T., 2004a.Grazing systems, ecosystem responses, and global change.Annu.Rev.Environ.Resour. 29 (1), 261-299.

ID: 61094
Title: Influence of Nanofluids as the Heat Transfer Fluid in Solar Thermal Energy Storage System.
Author: M.Gajendran and N Nallusamy.
Editor: P K Bhattacharya
Year: 2015
Publisher: Dr. R k Pachauri.
Source: Centre for Ecological Sciences
Reference: TIDEE Vol.14 (1) (2015)
Subject: TERI information Digest on Energy and Environment.
Keywords: Solar energy, Thermal energy storage, Heat transfer fluid, Flat plate collector, Phase change material, Carbon nanofluids.
Abstract: Carbon nanofluids gain importance as heat transfer fluids due to their high thermal conductivity even with their presence in smaller fractions. This article investigates the influence of nanofluids as Heat Transfer Fluid (HTF) in Phase Change Material (PCM) based solar thermal energy storage system. The encapsulated cylindrical capsules contain the PCM, paraffin. The Thermal Energy Storage (TES) tank acts as a storage unit consisting of PCM capsules packed in three beds surrounded by water, which acts as Sensible Heat storage (SHS) material. The heat stored is a combination of sensible heat and latent heat. Carbon nanofluids transfer the heat received by solar Flat Plate Collector (FPC) from insolation to the TES tank. Carbon nanofluids of different concentration (0.1 percent and 0.3 per cent by weight) were prepared with the Sodium Dodecyl Benzene Sulphonate (SDBS), as the surfactant and this mixture is sonicated to ensure proper mixing of nanofluid with water. Performance parameters such as charging time, instantaneous heat stored, cumulative heat stored and system efficiency are studied for various HTFs. The results show that there is considerable amount of reduction in charging time, around 26 per cent for carbon nanofluid of 0.1 per cent and 42 per cent for 0.3 per cent, and improvement of system efficiency around 42 per cent with reference to charging time when compared with the conventional HTF, water.
Location: T E 15 New Biology Building.
Literature cited 1: Al-Jandal S S and Sayigh A A M.1994. Thermal performance characteristics of STC system with phase change storage. Renewable Energy 5 (1-4): 390-399. Cho K and Choi S H. 2000. Thermal characteristics of paraffin in a spherical capsule during freeing and melting processes. Int ?, Heat and Mass Transfer 43 (17): 3183-3196.
Literature cited 2: Nallusamy N, Sampath S and Velraj R. 2006. Study on performance of a packed bed latent heat thermal energy storage unit integrated with solar water heating system. ?.Zhejiang Univ.Science A 7 (8): 1422-1430. Heinz A and Streicher W. 2009. Application of phase change material and pcm slurries for thermal energy storage. Institute of Thermal Engineering, Graz University.

ID: 61093
Title: Delivery Mechanism for Energy Efficient Cookstoves: A Case Study from Rural India.
Author: R C Pal, Vivek Jha and Jitendra Tiwari.
Editor: P K Bhattacharya
Year: 2014
Publisher: Dr. R k Pachauri.
Source: Centre for Ecological Sciences
Reference: TIDEE Vol.13 (4) 447-451 (2014)
Subject: TERI information Digest on Energy and Environment.
Keywords: Improved forced draft cook stoves, Traditional cook stoves, Biomass fuels, Delivery mechanism.
Abstract: The domestic sector in India is the largest consumer of traditional sources of energy and accounts for 85 percent of households in the rural areas, using fuel wood as an important source of energy for cooking and kerosene for lighting applications. However, the penetration of commercial fuels for cooking in rural areas continues to be low, with 11.5 percent of rural households using kerosene and 6.5 percent using LPG (liquefied petroleum gas) for cooking.[1] Hence, rural households commonly use traditional biomass fuels in traditional cook stoves (TCs), which are not only inefficient but also have an adverse effect on the health of people, especially women and children, who are largely exposed to the smoke emitted while burning such fuels. In order to reduce the ill effects caused by the use of low-efficiency (<12 %) of TCs, introduction of improved forced draft biomass cook stoves will enhance cooking device efficiency and also improve the indoor kitchen environment. This article focuses on the adaptation process and service delivery mechanism for improved biomass cook stove. It also concentrates on the approach undertaken for leveraging technology and promotes the use of biomass and source energy in a sustainable manner.
Location: T E 15 New Biology Building.
Literature cited 1: National Sample Survey Organisation (NSSO) 2009-10- (Energy Statistics 2013). TERI Project Report No. 2008 RA02.2010.Sustainable Development through-Research, Customization and Demonstration of Technologies in Jagdishpur Block, district Sultanpur, Uttar Pradesh. The Energy and Resources Institute. New Delhi.
Literature cited 2: TERI Project Report No. 2008 RA02.2012. Sustainable Development through-Research, Customization and Demonstration of Technologies in Jagdishpur Block, district Sultanpur, Uttar Pradesh. The Energy and Resources Institute. New Delhi. Chaurey A and Kandpal T C, 2009. Solar lanterns for domestic lighting in India: Viability of central charging station model; Energy Policy 37, pp. 4910-4918.

ID: 61092
Title: Advances in Nanotechnological Research and Development in Medicine from Marine Resources.
Author: Mrinal K Ghose
Editor: P K Bhattacharya
Year: 2014
Publisher: Dr. R k Pachauri.
Source: Centre for Ecological Sciences
Reference: TIDEE Vol.13 (4) 439-445 (2014)
Subject: TERI information Digest on Energy and Environment.
Keywords: Marine organisms, Bioactive compounds, Human cell ultrastructure, Immune system.
Abstract: Nanoscience suggests a solid body of theory, upon which a technology could be built. The concept of nanotechnological research in the fields of marine science and technology is quite recent. This paper discusses the potentials for applications of nanotechnology in the areas of marine biomedicines, marine toxicology, marine industrial chemicals, and others. It holds a great promise for developing countries where fish and shelfish are a major source of food, as well as an industrial commodity. This technology points out that several marine organisms contain many bioactive chemical compounds with various pharmacological properties and have provided useful drugs. Therefore, it is seen that there is an immense potential for nanotechnology in marine sciences. This paper emphasizes that today there is a great need for exploitation of biologically active compounds and untapped food resources. Marine pollution control and management with the applications of nanotechnology have also been discussed in this paper. It includes that medical science will of course be heavily involved through the application of nanotechnology, which will impact not only human cell ultrastructure and effects on the immune system, but should also contribute to solving the riddle of allergy. This paper brings out that the advances in nanotechnological research will go a long way in innovations in chemical industries.
Location: T E 15 New Biology Building.
Literature cited 1: Medina C, Santos-Martinez MJ, Radomski A, Corrigan OI, Radomski MW.2007.Nanopartices: Pharmacological and Toxicological Significance.Br ? Pharmacol 150:pp.552-558. Gregoriadis G, Ryman BE.1972.Fate of Protein-containing Liposomes Injected in to Rats: An Approach to the Treatment of Storage Diseases. Eur ? Biochem 24: pp.485-491.
Literature cited 2: McCormack B, Gregoriadis G.1994.Drugs-in-cyclodextrins-inliposomes: A Novel Concept in Drug Delivery. Int ? Pharm 112: pp.249-258. Illum L, Davis S S.1984.The organ Uptake of Intravenously Administered Colloidal Particles can be Altered Using a Non-ionic Surfactant (Poloxamer 338). FEBS Lett 167: pp. 79-82.

ID: 61091
Title: Effects of Fuel Temperature on Biodiesel Spray Characteristics: An In-depth Study.
Author: P.Raghu, N.Nallusamy and K.Pitchandi.
Editor: P K Bhattacharya
Year: 2014
Publisher: Dr. R k Pachauri.
Source: Centre for Ecological Sciences
Reference: TIDEE Vol.13 (4) 431-438(2014)
Subject: TERI information Digest on Energy and Environment.
Keywords: Spray cone angle, Spray tip penetration, SMD, Spray chamber, Fuel temperature.
Abstract: Biodiesel is technically competitive with conventional petroleum-derived fuels and requires no changes in the fuel-distribution system. Moreover, there is an evidence that biodiesel-fuelled engine can have a strong impact on performance and pollutant emissions. Spray development plays a vital role in improving the combustion and emission characteristics of fuel because it directly affects the air-fuel mixture formation. Spray characteristics of fuel mainly depend on fuel-injection process, fuel density, viscosity, ambient pressure, and temperature. The purpose of this article is to reveal the effects of fuel temperature on the spray characteristics of Jatropha Oil Methyl Ester (JOME), Karanja Oil Methyl Ester (KOME), and Cotton Seed Oil Methyl Ester (COME) fuels in a spray chamber. The spray behaviour was analysed through spray characteristics such as spray cone angle and spray tip penetration using image-processing technique. The increase of fuel temperature from 40? C to 80? C caused a decrease in spray tip penetration and Sauter Mean Diameter (SMD) and an increase in spray cone angle. Experimental results show that the spray cone angle for JOME, KOME, and COME was increased, but spray tip penetration and SMD were decreased. This is due to the preheating of fuel which reduces density, viscosity, and surface tension of tested fuel.
Location: T E 15 New Biology Building.
Literature cited 1: Faeth GM. 1997.Mixing, transport and combustion in sprays. Progress Energy Combustion Science13:pp.293-345. Bari S, Lim T H, and Yu CW. 2007. Effects of preheating crude palm oil on injection system performance and emission of a diesel engine. Biomass and Bioenergy 27: pp. 339-351.
Literature cited 2: Boggavarapu P and Ravikrishan R.V. 2012.A comparison of Jatropha methyl ester and diesel spray.12th Triennial International Conference on Liquid Atomization and Spray Systems (ICLASS). Heidelberg: Germany, Sep 2-6, pp.1-12. Tran TH, Enomoto, Hiroshi, Kushita, Motoki, Sakitsu, and Takaaki.2010.Effect of fuel temperature on spray properties using local contact microwave heat. FISITA 2010 SC-0-16, pp.1-7.

ID: 61090
Title: Heavy rainfall in the Kedarnath valley of Uttarakhand during the advancing monsoon phase in June 2013.
Author: D.R.Sikka, Kamaljit Ray, Kalyan Chakravarthy, S.C.Bhan and Ajit Tyagi.
Editor: R. Srinivasan.
Year: 2015
Publisher: Current Science Association and Indian Academy of Sciences.
Source: Centre for Ecological Sciences
Reference: Current Science Vol. 109 (2) 353-361(2015)
Subject: Current Science.
Keywords: Heavy rainfall, landslides, monsoon season, rapid advance.
Abstract: During the monsoon season of 2013, the advance of monsoon over northwest (NW) Indian region showed large abnormality as arrival of rainfall over Punjab, Himachal Pradesh (HP), Uttarakhand, Haryana and Delhi occurred between 13 and 16 June 2013, nearly twice standard deviation earlier than normal. Such an early arrival by mid-June has been exceptional. The event was marked by unprecedented very heavy rainfall between 14 and 18 June 2013 over different meteorological sub-divisions of NW India. The event also led to human tragedy in Uttarakhand, in which many local people and pilgrims lost their lives. This heavy rainfall in fact moved from Punjab and HP during 14 and 15 June 2013 over NW India was highly organized and it was continuously sustained with mesoscale enhanced intensity over Uttarakhand, which dispels the opinion about cloud-burst. The present communication is aimed to study the observational aspects of the vigorous and rapid advance of monsoon rainfall over NW India and its intensification during 15-17 June 2013 over Uttarakhand.
Location: T E 15 New Biology Building.
Literature cited 1: Gabet, E.J., Burbank, D.W., Putkonen, J.K., Pratt-Sitaula, B.A. and Ojha, T., Rainfall thresholds for landsliding in the Himalayas of Nepal. Geomorphology, 2004, 63, 131-143; doi:10.1016/j.geomorph.2004.03.011. Sengupta, A., Gupta, S. and Anbarasu, K., Rainfall thresholds for the initiation of landslide at Lanta Khola in North Sikkim, India.Nat.Hazards, 2010, 52, 31-42; doi: 10.1007/s11069-009-9352-9.
Literature cited 2: Bhan, C., Paul, S.and Kharbanda, K.L., Cloud bursts in Himachal Pradesh.Mausam, 2004, 55 (4), 712-713. Houze, R.A., Wilson, D.C. and Smull, B.F., Monsoon convection in the Himalayan region as seen by the TRMM precipitation radar.Q.J.R.Meteorol.Soc, 2007, 133, 1389-1411.

ID: 61089
Title: Assessment of coastal erosion along the Indian coast on 1:25, 000 scale using satellite data of 1989-1991 and 2004-2006 time frames.
Author: A.S.Rajawat, H.B. Chauhan, R.Ratheesh, S.Rode, R.J.Bhanderi, M.Mahapatra, Mohit Kumar, R. Yadav, S.P.Abraham, S.S.Singh, K.N. Keshri and Ajai.
Editor: R. Srinivasan.
Year: 2015
Publisher: Current Science Association and Indian Academy of Sciences.
Source: Centre for Ecological Sciences
Reference: Current Science Vol. 109 (2) 347-353 (2015)
Subject: Current Science.
Keywords: Accretion, coastal erosion, shoreline changes, high and low tide lines, satellite data.
Abstract: The long stretch of coastline on either side of the Indian peninsula is subjected to varied coastal processes and anthropogenic pressures, which makes the coast vulnerable to erosion. There is no systematic inventory of shoreline changes occurring along the entire Indian coast on 1:25, 000 scale, which is required for planning measures to be taken up for protecting the coast at the national level. It is in this context that shoreline change mapping on 1:25, 000 scales for the entire Indian coast based on multidate satellite data in GIS environment has been carried out for 1989-1991 and 2004-2006 time frame. The present communication discusses salient observations and results from the shoreline change inventory. The results show that 3829 km (45.5 %) of the coast is under erosion, 3004 km (35.7 %) is getting accreted, while 1581 km (18.8 %) of the coast is more or less stable in nature. Highest percentage of shoreline under erosion is in the Nicobar Islands (88.7), while the percentage of accreting coastline is highest for Tamil Nadu (62.3) and Goa has the highest percentage of stable shoreline (52.4). The analysis shows that the Indian coast has lost a net area of about 73 sq.km during 1989-1991 and 2004-2006 time frame. In Tamil Nadu, a net area of about 25.45 sq.km has increased due to accretion, while along the Nicobar Islands about 93.95 sq.km is most due to erosion. The inventory has been used to prepare a shoreline Change Atlas of the Indian Coast.
Location: T E 15 New Biology Building.
Literature cited 1: Nicholls, R. J. and Cazenave, A., Sea-level rise and its impact on coastal zones. Science, 2010, 328, 1517. NRC, Managing coastal erosion, National Research Council, National Academy Press, Washington ,DC, 1990, p. 182.
Literature cited 2: Eurosion, Living with coastal erosion in Europe: sediment and space for sustainability. Part IV- a guide to coastal erosion management practices in Europe: lessons learned, 2004, p.37. Mujabar, S., Chandrasekar, N. and Magesh, N.S., Shoreline change analysis along the coast between Kanyakumari and Tuticorin of India using remote sensing and GIS.Arab.J.Geosci., 2013, 6 (3), 647-664.

ID: 61088
Title: Impacts of rice intensification system on two C.D.blocks of Barddhaman district, West Bengal.
Author: Biswajit Ghosh and Namita Chakma
Editor: R. Srinivasan.
Year: 2015
Publisher: Current Science Association and Indian Academy of Sciences.
Source: Centre for Ecological Sciences
Reference: Current Science Vol. 109 (2) 342-346 (2015)
Subject: Current Science.
Keywords: Agro-ecology, benefit-cost ratio, economic and ecological potentiality, system of rice intensification.
Abstract: Rice is an important cereal crop of West Bengal and many of the Indian states. There is a compelling need to increase rice productivity vertically in West Bengal due to less availability of land and greater dependency of the population on the productivity of the land. For this reason, the economic and ecological potentiality of the system of rice intensification (SRI) has been evaluated by several researchers. In the present study, Monteswar and Memari-II C.D. blocks of Barddhaman district, West Bengal have been selected to analyse the impacts of SRI on economic and ecological aspects of rice-growing. Results show that benefit-cost (B:C) ratio in SRI practice is significantly higher than the conventional method of rice cultivation. Under SRI B: C ratio varies from 5.06:1 to 3:1, but in the conventional method it varies from 2.18:1 to 1.78:1. Therefore, SRI farmers are experiencing multiple benefits in terms of both economics and ecology.
Location: T E 15 New Biology Building.
Literature cited 1: Kumar, G.A., Sailaja, V., Satyagopal, P.V.and Prasad, S.V., Evaluation of profile characteristics of SRI cultivation farmers in relation to their extent of adoption of technologies.Curr.Biotica, 2014, 8,36-41. Raju, R.A. and Sreenivas, Ch., Agronomic evaluation of system of rice intensification methods in Godavari delta. ORYZA, 2008, 45, 280-283.
Literature cited 2: Thakur, A.K., Critiquing SRI criticism: beyond skepticism with Empiricism.Curr.Sci, 2010, 98, 1294-1299. Uphoff, N., Kassam, A., and Thakur, A., Challenges of increasing water saving and water productivity in the rice sector: introduction to the system of rice intensification (SRI) and this issue. Taiwan J. Water Conserv, 2013, 61, 1-13.