The Global Canopy Atlas: analysis-ready maps of 3D structure for the world's woody ecosystems

Abstract

Woody canopies regulate exchanges of energy, water and carbon, and their three-dimensional (3D) structure supports much of terrestrial biodiversity. Remote sensing technologies such as airborne laser scanning (ALS) now enable the 3D mapping of entire landscapes. However, we lack the large, harmonized and geographically representative ALS collections needed to build a global picture of woody ecosystem structure. To address this challenge, we developed the Global Canopy Atlas (GCA): 3,458 ALS acquisitions transformed into standardized and analysis-ready maps of canopy height and elevation at 1 m2 resolution. The GCA covers 56,554 km2 across all major biomes. 19% of this area has been scanned multiple times, and 87% of all GCA products are openly available, covering 95% of the total area. To showcase its wide range of applications, we applied the GCA in three case studies. First, we validated three global satellite-derived canopy height maps, finding poor performance at native resolution (1-30 m, R2 < 0.38) and moderate performance at 250 m resolution (R2 < 0.65). Second, analyzing global patterns in canopy gap size frequency we discovered an unexpectedly large variation of power law exponents from branch to stand level ( = 1.52 to 2.38), pointing to a fundamental scale-dependence of forest structure. Third, we developed a framework to standardize forest turnover quantification from multi-source, multi-temporal ALS. In a temperate forest in North America it revealed that 21% of canopy gaps closed within 12 years of opening and would thus be missed by infrequent monitoring. As demonstrated by these case studies, the GCA provides a novel data source for ecologists, foresters, remote sensing scientists and the ecosystem modelling community that substantially advances our ability to understand the structure and dynamics of woody ecosystems at global scales.

Plant phenotyping relevance

ALSから樹冠高・標高などの植物群落構造形質を標準化して提供する大規模データ基盤を開発し、既存マップの検証や森林構造解析にも用いており、フェノタイピング手法・データ基盤が中心である。

Code and data availability

The paper's core asset is the Global Canopy Atlas itself (3,458 ALS-derived CHM/DTM/DSM maps), stated to be made freely available via ESA's MAAP platform, but no MAAP URL or other authors' repository URL appears in the supplied blocks or the allowed URL list. All URLs present (OpenTopography, 3DEP, ELVIS, Embrapa/SusL,

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