Quantifying the Variation in Reflectance Spectra of Metrosideros polymorpha Canopies across Environmental Gradients

Imaging spectroscopy is a burgeoning tool for understanding ecosystem functioning on large spatial scales, yet the application of this technology to assess intra-specific trait variation across environmental gradients has been poorly tested. Selection specific genotypes via filtering plays an important role in driving and thus functional diversity space time, but relative contributions species turnover are still unclear. To address issue, we quantified reflectance spectra within between six uniform stands Metrosideros polymorpha elevation soil substrate age Hawai‘i Island. Airborne imaging light detection ranging (LiDAR) data were merged capture isolate sunlit portions canopies at M. polymorpha-dominated sites. Both intra-site inter-site spectral variations using several analyses. A support vector machine (SVM) model revealed that each site was spectrally distinct, while Euclidean distances centroids principal components (PC) indicated drive separation canopy Coefficients among spectra, as well intrinsic dimensionality data, demonstrated hierarchical effect age, followed by elevation, determining variation. Assessments based leaf estimated from resulted similar patterns sites PC distinction SVM model. Using highly polymorphic species, follows known ecological principles community how remote sensing addresses forest assembly scales.