ALOS-2 L-band SAR backscatter data improves the estimation and temporal transferability of wildfire effects on soil properties under different post-fire vegetation responses.

Autor: Fernández-Guisuraga JM; Area of Ecology, Department of Biodiversity and Environmental Management, Faculty of Biological and Environmental Sciences, University of León, 24071 León, Spain. Electronic address: jofeg@unileon.es., Marcos E; Area of Ecology, Department of Biodiversity and Environmental Management, Faculty of Biological and Environmental Sciences, University of León, 24071 León, Spain., Suárez-Seoane S; Department of Organisms and Systems Biology, Ecology Unit, Research Institute of Biodiversity (IMIB; UO-CSIC-PA), University of Oviedo, Oviedo, Mieres, Spain., Calvo L; Area of Ecology, Department of Biodiversity and Environmental Management, Faculty of Biological and Environmental Sciences, University of León, 24071 León, Spain.
Jazyk: angličtina
Zdroj: The Science of the total environment [Sci Total Environ] 2022 Oct 10; Vol. 842, pp. 156852. Date of Electronic Publication: 2022 Jun 22.
DOI: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2022.156852
Abstrakt: Remote sensing techniques are of particular interest for monitoring wildfire effects on soil properties, which may be highly context-dependent in large and heterogeneous burned landscapes. Despite the physical sense of synthetic aperture radar (SAR) backscatter data for characterizing soil spatial variability in burned areas, this approach remains completely unexplored. This study aimed to evaluate the performance of SAR backscatter data in C-band (Sentinel-1) and L-band (ALOS-2) for monitoring fire effects on soil organic carbon and nutrients (total nitrogen and available phosphorous) at short term in a heterogeneous Mediterranean landscape mosaic made of shrublands and forests that was affected by a large wildfire. The ability of SAR backscatter coefficients and several band transformations of both sensors for retrieving soil properties measured in the field in immediate post-fire situation (one month after fire) was tested through a model averaging approach. The temporal transferability of SAR-based models from one month to one year after wildfire was also evaluated, which allowed to assess short-term changes in soil properties at large scale as a function of pre-fire plant community type. The retrieval of soil properties in immediate post-fire conditions featured a higher overall fit and predictive capacity from ALOS-2 L-band SAR backscatter data than from Sentinel-1 C-band SAR data, with the absence of noticeable under and overestimation effects. The transferability of the ALOS-2 based model to one year after wildfire exhibited similar performance to that of the model calibration scenario (immediate post-fire conditions). Soil organic carbon and available phosphorous content was significantly higher one year after wildfire than immediately after the fire disturbance. Conversely, the short-term change in soil total nitrogen was ecosystem-dependent. Our results support the applicability of L-band SAR backscatter data for monitoring short-term variability of fire effects on soil properties, reducing data gathering costs within large and heterogeneous burned landscapes.
Competing Interests: Declaration of competing interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.
(Copyright © 2022 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)
Databáze: MEDLINE
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