Monitoring landscape dynamics in central U.S. grasslands with harmonized Landsat-8 and Sentinel-2 time series data
Qiang Zhou, Jennifer Rover, Jesslyn F. Brown, Bruce B. Worstell, Danny Howard, Zhuoting Wu, Alisa L. Gallant, Bradley Rundquist, Morgan Burke
2019, Remote Sensing (11)
Remotely monitoring changes in central U.S. grasslands is challenging because these landscapes tend to respond quickly to disturbances and changes in weather. Such dynamic responses influence nutrient cycling, greenhouse gas contributions, habitat availability for wildlife, and other ecosystem processes and services. Traditionally, coarse-resolution satellite data acquired at daily intervals have...
Investigating lake-area dynamics across a permafrost-thaw spectrum using airborne electromagnetic surveys and remote sensing time-series data in Yukon Flats, Alaska
David Rey, Michelle Ann Walvoord, Burke Minsley, Jennifer Rover, Kamini Singha
2019, Environmental Research Letters (14) 1-13
Lakes in boreal lowlands cycle carbon and supply an important source of freshwater for wildlife and migratory waterfowl. The abundance and distribution of these lakes are supported, in part, by permafrost distribution, which is subject to change. Relationships between permafrost thaw and lake dynamics remain poorly known in most boreal...
Using remote sensing to quantify ecosystem site potential community structure and deviation in the Great Basin, United States
Matthew B. Rigge, Collin G. Homer, Bruce K. Wylie, Yingxin Gu, Hua Shi, George Z. Xian, Debra K. Meyer, Brett Bunde
2019, Ecological Indicators (96) 516-531
The semi-arid Great Basin region in the Northwest U.S. is impacted by a suite of change agents including fire, grazing, and climate variability to which native vegetation can have low resilience and resistance. Assessing ecosystem condition in relation to these change agents is difficult due to a lack of a...
Estimating forest canopy cover dynamics in Valles Caldera National Preserve, New Mexico, using LiDAR and Landsat data
James W. Cain III, Kamal Humagain1, Carlos Portillo-Quintero1, Robert D. Cox1
2019, Applied Geography (99) 120-132
Increasing tree canopy cover has led to increasing wildfire activity in conifer dominated areas of the southwestern United States. Estimating historical changes in the spatial distribution of tree canopy cover can provide further insights into the dynamics of forest and fuel conditions in these landscapes...
Nominal 30-m cropland extent map of continental Africa by integrating pixel-based and object-based algorithms using Sentinel-2 and Landsat-8 Data on Google Earth Engine
Jun Xiong, Prasad S. Thenkabail, James C. Tilton, Murali Krishna Gumma, Pardhasaradhi G. Teluguntla, Adam Oliphant, Russell G. Congalton, Kamini Yadav, Noel Gorelick
2019, Remote Sensing (9)
A satellite-derived cropland extent map at high spatial resolution (30-m or better) is a must for food and water security analysis. Precise and accurate global cropland extent maps, indicating cropland and non-cropland areas, are starting points to develop higher-level products such as crop watering methods (irrigated or rainfed), cropping intensities...
User needs for future Landsat missions
Zhuoting Wu, Gregory Snyder, Carolyn M. Vadnais, Rohit Arora, Michael Babcock, Gregory L. Stensaas, Peter Doucette, Timothy Newman
2019, Remote Sensing of Environment (231)
Landsat satellites have been operating since 1972, providing the longest continuous observation record of the Earth’s land surface. Over the past half century, the Landsat user community has grown exponentially, encompassing more diverse and evolving scientific research and operational uses. Understanding current and future user needs is crucial to informing...
Landsat benefiting society for fifty years
Laura E. P. Rocchio, Peggy Connot, Steve Young, Kate Ramsayer, Linda Owen, Michelle Bouchard, Christopher Barnes
2018, Report
Since 1972, data acquired by the Landsat series of satellites have become integral to land management for both government and the private sector, providing scientists and decision makers with key information about agricultural productivity, ice sheet dynamics, urban growth, forest monitoring, natural resource management, water quality, and supporting disaster response....
Interior Least Tern sandbar nesting habitat measurements from Landsat Thematic Mapper imagery
Edward A. Bulliner, Caroline M. Elliott, Robert B. Jacobson, Casey Lott
2018, Data Series 1098
Sandbars of large sand-bedded rivers of the central United States serve important ecological functions to many species, including the endangered Interior Least Tern (Sternula antillarum, ILT). The ILT is a colonial bird that feeds on fish and nests primarily on riverine sandbars during its annual breeding season of around May...
Crop water productivity estimation with hyperspectral remote sensing
Michael Marshall, Itiya Aneece, Daniel Foley, Cai Xueliang, Trent Biggs
2018, Book chapter, Hyperspectral remote sensing of vegetation: Advanced applications in remote Sensing of agricultural crops and natural vegetation
Crop water productivity (CWP) is the ratio of accumulated crop biomass or yield (Y) to the water utilized to produce it, which is typically estimated using transpiration (ETC). CWP is an important metric to test and monitor water-saving strategies in agroecosystems across the globe. Red and near-infrared broadbands have been...
Analysis ready data: Enabling analysis of the Landsat archive
John L. Dwyer, David P. Roy, Brian Sauer, Calli B. Jenkerson, Hankui K. Zhang, Leo Lymburner
2018, Remote Sensing (10)
Data that have been processed to allow analysis with a minimum of additional user effort are often referred to as Analysis Ready Data (ARD). The ability...
Analysis of multi-decadal wetland changes, and cumulative impact of multiple storms 1984 to 2017
Steven H. Douglas, Julie Bernier, Kathryn Smith
2018, Wetlands Ecology and Management (26) 1121-1142
Land-cover classification analysis using Landsat satellite imagery acquired between 1984 and 2017 quantified short- (post-Hurricane Sandy) and long-term wetland-change trends along the Maryland and Virginia coasts between Metompkin Bay, VA and Ocean City, MD. Although there are limited options for upland migration of wetlands in the study area, regression analysis...
Remote sensing vegetation index methods to evaluate changes in greenness and evapotranspiration in riparian vegetation in response to the Minute 319 environmental pulse flow to Mexico
Pamela L. Nagler, Christopher J. Jarchow, Edward P. Glenn
2018, Proceedings of the International Association of Hydrological Sciences (380) 45-54
During the spring of 2014, 130 million m3 of water were released from the United States' Morelos Dam on the lower Colorado River to Mexico, allowing water to reach the Gulf of California for the first time in 13 years. Our study assessed the effects of water transfer or ecological environmental flows from...
Estimating soil respiration in a subalpine landscape using point, terrain, climate and greenness data
Erin Michele Berryman, Melanie K. Vanderhoof, John B. Bradford, Todd Hawbaker, Paul D. Henne, Sean P. Burns, John M. Frank, Richard A. Birdsey, Michael G. Ryan
2018, Journal of Geophysical Research G: Biogeosciences (123) 3231-3249
Landscape carbon (C) flux estimates are necessary for assessing the ability of terrestrial ecosystems to buffer further increases in anthropogenic carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions. Advances in remote sensing have allowed for coarse-scale estimates of gross primary productivity (GPP) (e.g., MODIS 17), yet efforts to assess spatial patterns in respiration lag...
Status of tidal marsh mapping for blue carbon inventories
Kristin B. Byrd, Chris Mcowen, Lauren Weatherdon, James Holmquist, Stephen Crooks
2018, Book chapter, A blue carbon primer: The state of coastal wetland carbon science, practice and policy
Remote-sensing-based maps of tidal marshes, both of their extents and carbon stocks, will play a key role in conducting greenhouse gas (GHG) inventories.The U.N. Environment Programme World Conservation Monitoring Centre has produced a new Global Distribution of Salt Marsh dataset that estimates global salt marsh area at 5.5 Mha.A Tier...
Landscape topoedaphic features create refugia from drought and insect disturbance in a lodgepole and whitebark pine forest
Jennifer M. Cartwright
2018, Forests (9) 1-35
Droughts and insect outbreaks are primary disturbance processes linking climate change to tree mortality in western North America. Refugia from these disturbances—locations where impacts are less severe relative to the surrounding landscape—may be priorities for conservation, restoration, and monitoring. In this study, hypotheses concerning physical and biological processes supporting refugia...
Analysis of different sensor performances in impervious surface mapping
George Z. Xian, Hua Shi, Jon Dewitz, Zhuoting Wu
2018, Conference Paper, IGARSS 2018 - 2018 IEEE International Geoscience and Remote Sensing Symposium
The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) has developed the National Land Cover Database (NLCD) to provide consistent land cover and land cover change products for the nation since 2001. As one of products in the NLCD, the percent impervious surface area (ISA), which was estimated with Landsat imagery, represents the fraction...
It matters when you measure it: Using snow-cover Normalised Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) to isolate post-fire conifer regeneration
Melanie K. Vanderhoof, Todd Hawbaker
2018, International Journal of Wildland Fire (27) 815-830
Landsat Normalised Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) is commonly used to monitor post-fire green-up; however, most studies do not distinguish new growth of conifer from deciduous or herbaceous species, despite potential consequences for local climate, carbon and wildlife. We found that dual season (growing and snow cover) NDVI...
Satellite remote sensing estimation of river discharge: Application to the Yukon River Alaska
David M. Bjerklie, Charon M. Birkett, John Jones, Claudia C. Carabajal, Jennifer Rover, John Fulton, Pierre-Andre Garambois
2018, Journal of Hydrology (561) 1000-1018
A methodology based on general hydraulic relations for rivers has been developed to estimate the discharge (flow rate) of rivers using satellite remote sensing observations. The estimates of discharge, flow depth, and flow velocity are derived from remotely observed water...
Mapping crop residue and tillage intensity using WorldView-3 satellite shortwave infrared residue indices
W. Dean Hively, Brian T. Lamb, Craig S. T. Daughtry, Jacob Shermeyer, Gregory W. McCarty, Miguel Quemada
2018, Remote Sensing (10) 1-22
Crop residues serve many important functions in agricultural conservation including preserving soil moisture, building soil organic carbon, and preventing erosion. Percent crop residue cover on a field surface reflects the outcome of tillage intensity and crop management practices. Previous studies using proximal hyperspectral remote sensing have demonstrated accurate measurement of...
A 30-m landsat-derived cropland extent product of Australia and China using random forest machine learning algorithm on Google Earth Engine cloud computing platform
Pardhasaradhi Teluguntla, Prasad S. Thenkabail, Adam Oliphant, Jun Xiong, Murali Krishna Gumma, Russell G. Congalton, Kamini Yadav, Alfredo Huete
2018, ISPRS Journal of Photogrammetry and Remote Sensing (144) 325-340
Mapping high resolution (30-m or better) cropland extent over very large areas such as continents or large countries or regions accurately, precisely, repeatedly, and rapidly is of great importance for addressing the global food and water security challenges. Such cropland extent products capture individual farm fields, small or large, and...
A new generation of the United States National Land Cover Database: Requirements, research priorities, design, and implementation strategies
Limin Yang, Suming Jin, Patrick Danielson, Collin Homer, Leila Gass, Stacie M Bender, Adam Case, Catherine Costello, Jon Dewitz, Joyce Fry, Michelle Funk, Brian J. Granneman, Greg C Liknes, Matthew B. Rigge, George Z. Xian
2018, ISPRS Journal of Photogrammetry and Remote Sensing (146) 108-123
The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS), in partnership with several federal agencies, has developed and released four National Land Cover Database (NLCD) products over the past two decades: NLCD 1992, 2001, 2006, and 2011. These products provide spatially explicit and reliable information on the Nation’s land cover and land cover change....
U.S. Landsat Analysis Ready Data
U.S. Geological Survey
2018, Fact Sheet 2018-3053
U.S. Landsat Analysis Ready Data (ARD) are a revolutionary new U.S. Geological Survey science product that allows the Landsat archive to be more accessible and easier to analyze and reduces the amount of time users spend on data processing for monitoring and assessing landscape change. U.S. Landsat ARD are Level-2 products derived...
Sensitivity of mangrove range limits to climate variability
Kyle C. Cavanaugh, Michael J. Osland, Rémi Bardou, Gustavo Hinojosa-Arango, Juan M. López-Vivas, John D. Parker, Andre S. Rovai
2018, Global Ecology and Biogeography (27) 925-935
AimCorrelative distribution models have been used to identify potential climatic controls of mangrove range limits, but there is still uncertainty about the relative importance of these factors across different regions. To provide insights into the strength of climatic control of different mangrove range limits, we tested...
Accuracy assessment of NLCD 2011 impervious cover data for the Chesapeake Bay region, USA
James Wickham, Nate Herold, Stephen V. Stehman, Collin Homer, George Z. Xian, Peter Claggett
2018, ISPRS Journal of Photogrammetry and Remote Sensing (146) 151-160
The National Land Cover Database (NLCD) contains three eras (2001, 2006, 2011) of percentage urban impervious cover (%IC) at the native pixel size (30 m-x-30 m) of the Landsat Thematic Mapper satellite. These data are potentially valuable to environmental managers and stakeholders because of the utility of %IC as...
Landsat Collections
U.S. Geological Survey
2018, Fact Sheet 2018-3049
In 2016, the U.S. Geological Survey reorganized the Landsat archive into a tiered collection structure, which ensures that Landsat Level-1 products provide a consistent archive of known data quality to support time-series analyses and data “stacking” while controlling continuous improvement of the archive and access to all data as they are...