Abstract
The vertical and horizontal structure of forest canopies is one of the most important driving factors of various ecosystem processes and has received increasing attention during the past 20 years and served as an impetus for earth observation missions. In the remote sensing community, the variables which describe canopy structure are called biophysical variables, and are directly coupled with the fundamental physical problem behind remote sensing: radiative transfer in vegetation. There are basically three different approaches to interpreting biophysical variables from remotely sensed data: (1) empirical, (2) physically based, and (3) various combinations of them. The physical approach builds upon an understanding of the physical laws governing the transfer of solar radiation in vegetative canopies, and formulates it mathematically by canopy reflectance models which relate the spectral signal to biophysical properties of the vegetation. In this chapter, we will first outline the basic principles and existing physically based model types for simulating the spectral signature of forests. After this, the focus is on the specific issues related to applying these models to the complex 3D structure of coniferous canopies.
Original language | English |
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Title of host publication | Advances in Land Remote Sensing |
Subtitle of host publication | System, Modeling, Inversion and Application |
Pages | 147-171 |
Number of pages | 25 |
Publication status | Published - 1 Dec 2008 |
MoE publication type | A4 Article in a conference publication |
Event | 2005 9th International Symposium on Physical Measurements and Signatures in Remote Sensing - Beijing, China Duration: 1 Oct 2005 → 1 Oct 2005 |
Conference
Conference | 2005 9th International Symposium on Physical Measurements and Signatures in Remote Sensing |
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Country | China |
City | Beijing |
Period | 1/10/05 → 1/10/05 |