6,928 research outputs found
Modelling Spatial Compositional Data: Reconstructions of past land cover and uncertainties
In this paper, we construct a hierarchical model for spatial compositional
data, which is used to reconstruct past land-cover compositions (in terms of
coniferous forest, broadleaved forest, and unforested/open land) for five time
periods during the past years over Europe. The model consists of a
Gaussian Markov Random Field (GMRF) with Dirichlet observations. A block
updated Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC), including an adaptive Metropolis
adjusted Langevin step, is used to estimate model parameters. The sparse
precision matrix in the GMRF provides computational advantages leading to a
fast MCMC algorithm. Reconstructions are obtained by combining pollen-based
estimates of vegetation cover at a limited number of locations with scenarios
of past deforestation and output from a dynamic vegetation model. To evaluate
uncertainties in the predictions a novel way of constructing joint confidence
regions for the entire composition at each prediction location is proposed. The
hierarchical model's ability to reconstruct past land cover is evaluated
through cross validation for all time periods, and by comparing reconstructions
for the recent past to a present day European forest map. The evaluation
results are promising and the model is able to capture known structures in past
land-cover compositions
Land cover classification using fuzzy rules and aggregation of contextual information through evidence theory
Land cover classification using multispectral satellite image is a very
challenging task with numerous practical applications. We propose a multi-stage
classifier that involves fuzzy rule extraction from the training data and then
generation of a possibilistic label vector for each pixel using the fuzzy rule
base. To exploit the spatial correlation of land cover types we propose four
different information aggregation methods which use the possibilistic class
label of a pixel and those of its eight spatial neighbors for making the final
classification decision. Three of the aggregation methods use Dempster-Shafer
theory of evidence while the remaining one is modeled after the fuzzy k-NN
rule. The proposed methods are tested with two benchmark seven channel
satellite images and the results are found to be quite satisfactory. They are
also compared with a Markov random field (MRF) model-based contextual
classification method and found to perform consistently better.Comment: 14 pages, 2 figure
Hierarchical spatial models for predicting tree species assemblages across large domains
Spatially explicit data layers of tree species assemblages, referred to as
forest types or forest type groups, are a key component in large-scale
assessments of forest sustainability, biodiversity, timber biomass, carbon
sinks and forest health monitoring. This paper explores the utility of coupling
georeferenced national forest inventory (NFI) data with readily available and
spatially complete environmental predictor variables through spatially-varying
multinomial logistic regression models to predict forest type groups across
large forested landscapes. These models exploit underlying spatial associations
within the NFI plot array and the spatially-varying impact of predictor
variables to improve the accuracy of forest type group predictions. The
richness of these models incurs onerous computational burdens and we discuss
dimension reducing spatial processes that retain the richness in modeling. We
illustrate using NFI data from Michigan, USA, where we provide a comprehensive
analysis of this large study area and demonstrate improved prediction with
associated measures of uncertainty.Comment: Published in at http://dx.doi.org/10.1214/09-AOAS250 the Annals of
Applied Statistics (http://www.imstat.org/aoas/) by the Institute of
Mathematical Statistics (http://www.imstat.org
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