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Title: The 2013 FLEX—US Airborne Campaign at the Parker Tract Loblolly Pine Plantation in North Carolina, USA

Journal Article · · Remote Sensing
DOI:https://doi.org/10.3390/rs9060612· OSTI ID:1537157
 [1];  [2];  [3];  [4];  [1];  [5]; ORCiD logo [2];  [2];  [6];  [7];  [8];  [9];  [4];  [10];  [11];  [9];  [12];  [13]
  1. NASA Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC), Greenbelt, MD (United States). Biospheric Sciences Lab.
  2. Forschungszentrum Juelich (Germany).Inst. of Bio- and Geoscience
  3. Science Systems & Applications Inc., Lanham, MD (United States)
  4. Univ. of Maryland Baltimore County (UMBC), Baltimore, MD (United States). Joint Center for Earth Systems Technology
  5. North Carolina State Univ., Raleigh, NC (United States). Dept. Forestry & Environmental Resources
  6. Univ. of Valencia (Spain). Image Processing Laboratory (IPL)
  7. Univ. of Zurich (Switzerland). Remote Sensing Lab.
  8. German Research Center for Geosciences (GFZ), Potsdam (Germany). Helmholtz Centre Potsdam
  9. Univ. of Milano-Bicocca,Milano (Italy). Dept. of Environmental Sciences
  10. Global Science & Technology, Inc., Greenbelt, MD (United States)
  11. Univ. Space Research Associates, Columbia, MD (United States)
  12. Earth Observations (ESTEC), Noordwijk (The Netherlands)
  13. Earth Observations (ESA-ESRIN), Frascati (Italy)

The first European Space Agency (ESA) and NASA collaboration in an airborne campaign to support ESA’s FLuorescence EXplorer (FLEX) mission was conducted in North Carolina, USA during September–October 2013 (FLEX-US 2013) at the Parker Tract Loblolly Pine (LP) Plantation (Plymouth, NC, USA). This campaign combined two unique airborne instrument packages to obtain simultaneous observations of solar-induced fluorescence (SIF), LiDAR-based canopy structural information, visible through shortwave infrared (VSWIR) reflectance spectra, and surface temperature, to advance vegetation studies of carbon cycle dynamics and ecosystem health. We obtained statistically significant results for fluorescence, canopy temperature, and tower fluxes from data collected at four times of day over two consecutive autumn days across an age class chronosequence. Both the red fluorescence (F685) and far-red fluorescence (F740) radiances had highest values at mid-day, but their fluorescence yields exhibited different diurnal responses across LP age classes. The diurnal trends for F685 varied with forest canopy temperature difference (canopy minus air), having a stronger daily amplitude change for young vs. old canopies. The Photochemical Reflectance Index (PRI) was positively correlated with this temperature variable over the diurnal cycle. Tower measurements from mature loblolly stand showed the red/far-red fluorescence ratio was linearly related to canopy light use efficiency (LUE) over the diurnal cycle, but performed even better for the combined morning/afternoon (without midday) observations. This study demonstrates the importance of diurnal observations for interpretation of fluorescence dynamics, the need for red fluorescence to understand canopy physiological processes, and the benefits of combining fluorescence, reflectance, and structure information to clarify canopy function versus structure characteristics for a coniferous forest.

Research Organization:
North Carolina State University, Raleigh, NC (United States)
Sponsoring Organization:
USDOE Office of Science (SC)
Grant/Contract Number:
SC0006700
OSTI ID:
1537157
Journal Information:
Remote Sensing, Vol. 9, Issue 6; ISSN 2072-4292
Publisher:
MDPICopyright Statement
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English
Citation Metrics:
Cited by: 26 works
Citation information provided by
Web of Science

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Cited By (12)

Assessing Vegetation Function with Imaging Spectroscopy journal February 2019
Variability of sun-induced chlorophyll fluorescence according to stand age-related processes in a managed loblolly pine forest journal March 2018
Diurnal and Seasonal Solar Induced Chlorophyll Fluorescence and Photosynthesis in a Boreal Scots Pine Canopy journal January 2019
Sun-Induced Chlorophyll Fluorescence II: Review of Passive Measurement Setups, Protocols, and Their Application at the Leaf to Canopy Level journal April 2019
A Spectral Fitting Algorithm to Retrieve the Fluorescence Spectrum from Canopy Radiance journal August 2019
The High-Performance Airborne Imaging Spectrometer HyPlant—From Raw Images to Top-of-Canopy Reflectance and Fluorescence Products: Introduction of an Automatized Processing Chain journal November 2019
Sun-induced chlorophyll fluorescence II: Review of passive measurement setups, protocols, and their application at the leaf to canopy level text January 2019
Assessing vegetation function with imaging spectroscopy text January 2019
The high-performance airborne imaging spectrometer HyPlant—from raw images to top-of-canopy reflectance and fluorescence products: introduction of an automatized processing chain text January 2019
Variability of sun-induced chlorophyll fluorescence according to stand age-related processes in a managed loblolly pine forest text January 2018
Review of Top-of-Canopy Sun-Induced Fluorescence (SIF) Studies from Ground, UAV, Airborne to Spaceborne Observations journal February 2020
From Nucleotides to Satellite Imagery: Approaches to Identify and Manage the Invasive Pathogen Xylella fastidiosa and Its Insect Vectors in Europe journal June 2020