FlexFund

European beech forests are subjected to extended periods of drought and beech trees show a growing vulnerability towards this changing climate. With the economic and ecological importance of beech trees, mapping and monitoring their stress symptoms is a crucial step for implementing management practices.

Therefore, we aim at mapping differences in stress responses among beech trees (intraspecific variability), based on airborne image data with very rich spectral information (hyperspectral imagery) from beech forests across Europe. This kind of data is used to extract information not only about coloration but also structure, water content, and foliage quality. This will allow us to study the association of holistically assessed stress symptoms with environmental factors, overlaid on the general functional (spectral) variation observable across beech canopies. We will furthermore identify possible lower-resolution indicators based on downsampling these data that could be used to detect specific types of stress responses from Earth observation instruments. This seed funding will foster new collaborations with world-leading remote sensing laboratories, kickstarting new proposals and third-party funding for the Leipzig University. Further, these collaborations have the potential to create synergies within the Breathing Nature excellence initiative at the intersection of climate and biodiversity.

This proposal specifically outlines a research stay at Jean-Baptiste Féret’s lab at TETIS, INRAE, aimed at studying differences in stress symptoms of Fagus sylvatica (European beech) across Europe using hyperspectral imaging."

RSC4Earth
Remote Sensing Center for the Earth System Research