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Remotesensing 14 05068
Remotesensing 14 05068
Editorial
Novel Approaches in Tropical Forests Mapping and
Monitoring–Time for Operationalization
Carlos Portillo-Quintero 1, *, Jose L. Hernández-Stefanoni 2 , Gabriela Reyes-Palomeque 2
and Mukti R. Subedi 1,3
For more than three decades, the remote sensing scientific community has successfully
generated predictive models of tropical forest attributes and ecological processes at the
leaf, canopy, patch and landscape scale by linking field-measured data to remotely sensed
spectral values, as well as other variables derived from remotely sensed data. The main
interest of these applications is to help describe ecological and functional patterns occurring
at larger geographic scales with sufficient accuracy and precision and enable scientists
to better understand ecological processes, such as the relationship between atmospheric
fluxes, plant structural and ecophysiological traits, soil attributes, anthropogenic use,
species occurrence and animal movement. However, as the earth’s environment suffers
from ever-increasing human use and abuse, detecting spatiotemporal changes in these
variables has become a necessary decision-making tool in conservation action and natural
Citation: Portillo-Quintero, C.; resources’ management. Moving from modeling into the study of soil, plants, wildlife and
Hernández-Stefanoni, J.L.; socioecological processes using remotely sensed data requires the extrapolation of single
Reyes-Palomeque, G.; Subedi, M.R.
time-step models to its application on a time series of data with the same expected accuracy.
Novel Approaches in Tropical Forests
The challenges in this matter are not trivial, since changes in soil moisture conditions, cloud
Mapping and Monitoring–Time for
contamination, canopy and leaf-level geometry and physiology can affect the strength of
Operationalization. Remote Sens.
the proposed models. In this context, the term ‘Operationalization’ refers to migration from
2022, 14, 5068. https://doi.org/
single time-step models to time series but also refers to the design and implementation
10.3390/rs14205068
of user-friendly tools to increase the efficacy of communicating spatiotemporal trends to
Received: 15 September 2022 the users.
Accepted: 4 October 2022 Today, dense time series of optical, radar, and LiDAR in proximal, airborne, and
Published: 11 October 2022 space-borne sensing systems have become publicly available and are accessible through
Publisher’s Note: MDPI stays neutral cloud-based platforms. In addition, efficient data processing using desktop or web-based in-
with regard to jurisdictional claims in teractive programming software has helped scientists develop new ways to detect changes
published maps and institutional affil- in tropical forest attributes at multiple geographic and temporal scales using dense time
iations. series of remotely sensed data. This Special Issue, entitled “Novel Approaches in Tropical
Forest Mapping and Monitoring—Time for Operationalization I”, focuses on state-of-the-art
research that addresses the challenges of upscaling biological, biophysical and biochemical
attributes of tropical forests in complex landscapes and understanding their dynamics at
Copyright: © 2022 by the authors. multiple spatial and temporal scales.
Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. In the first submitted communication, Portillo-Quintero et al. [1] review the state-of-
This article is an open access article
the-art in modeling techniques for forest-cover changes, forest structure, species composi-
distributed under the terms and
tion, and structural and functional vegetation attributes. Portillo-Quintero et al. indicate
conditions of the Creative Commons
that current operational monitoring systems are mostly focused on biomass and forest
Attribution (CC BY) license (https://
cover change, and recommends integrating multiple data sources and techniques to mon-
creativecommons.org/licenses/by/
itor structural, functional, and compositional attributes using tropical forest monitoring
4.0/).
Escobar-Lopez et al. [9] were able to predict the location and distribution of three types
of coffee agroforestry systems in the tropical forests of Chiapas, Mexico through the use
of Sentinel-1, Sentinel-2 and ALOS-PALSAR images. The methodological approach was
efficient at differentiating coffee agroforestry systems within forest landscapes, reported as
a common issue when using conventional satellite images. The study used multitemporal
imagery and a two-step classification approach using machine learning and a probabilistic
algorithm that ensured that each coffee agroforestry system was individually assessed in
the classification process. Their method achieved a 95% overall accuracy and, interestingly,
the authors found differences between the spectral indices and bands that better explained
the presence of each coffee agroforestry system.
Overall, the presented articles demonstrate the use of advanced tools and techniques
in remote sensing to address operational geographic problems in tropical forest mapping
and monitoring. The studies applied novel continuous change detection as well as ma-
chine learning and deep learning techniques for the time series analysis, classification and
modeling of reflectance values and textures metrics derived from optical, radar and LiDAR
data. Some of these studies also propose different conceptual frameworks for tropical forest
monitoring from local to landscape scales. The work here presented is the result of research
occurring in 17 institutions: Texas Tech University, Centro de Investigacion Cientifica de
Yucatan, Universidad de los Andes, Universidad Autonoma de Sinaloa, University of
California at Berkeley, Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Mexico, Colegio de la Frontera
Sur, Universidad Iberoamericana Ciudad de México, University of Freinburg, German
Aerospace Center, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, University of the Punjab, Kyoto
University, Forestry and Forest Products Research Institute, Tokyo University of Agricul-
ture, Sabah Forestry Department and CONACYT. As of September of 2022, all articles have
accumulated more than 11,000 full-text views, which corroborates the quality and relevance
of this Special Issue.
We believe that all the contributions to this Special Issue, entitled “Novel Approaches
in Tropical Forest Mapping and Monitoring—Time for Operationalization I”, constitute
advanced remote sensing applications for tropical forest research. More importantly,
a theme of all these manuscripts is the urgency of ensuring that these methodological
approaches are useful for tropical forest conservation action. Therefore, we hope that
these contributions can inform tropical forest scientists and GIS/RS analysts on the best
practices for identifying and monitoring ecological patterns and anthropogenic threats
using state-of-the-art remote sensing data and techniques.
References
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