Spatio-temporal patterns of vegetation dynamics for European land use and ecosystems over 1998-2011

The Fraction of Absorbed Photosynthetically Active Radiation (FAPAR) is an important variable suitable for monitoring climate changes impacts on the terrestrial biosphere. The study takes advantages of the most extensive data set of FAPAR available today at European scale derived from NASA/Sea-viewing Wide Field-of-view Sensor (SeaWiFS) and ESA/Medium Resolution Imaging Spectrometer Instrument (MERIS). In this work, we analyze vegetation dynamics over the European domain (25°N–72° N; 32°W–70° W) using FAPAR 10-days composites at ~ 1 km resolution from 1998 to 2011 obtained from the combination of two satellite-based sensors. This work proposes a set of phenology metrics from which are derived ecoregions with similar vegetation dynamics. Based on ecoregion and pixel-scale analyses, we quantify the seasonal and interannual vegetation variations. Trend detection is performed through statistical test to assess the significance of temporal and spatial changes in the phenology.

CECCHERINI Guido;  GOBRON Nadine; 

2013-02-25

ESA Special Publication, European Space Agency

JRC76384

978-92-9092-275-0,   

1609-042x,