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Remote Sensing Proxies for Deforestation and Soil Degradation in Landslide Mapping: A Review
Author(s) -
Miller Andrew Joseph
Publication year - 2013
Publication title -
geography compass
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.587
H-Index - 65
ISSN - 1749-8198
DOI - 10.1111/gec3.12050
Subject(s) - landslide , vegetation (pathology) , remote sensing , hazard , land cover , deforestation (computer science) , vegetation cover , slope stability , cover (algebra) , geology , land use , environmental science , hydrology (agriculture) , geotechnical engineering , computer science , civil engineering , engineering , ecology , medicine , mechanical engineering , pathology , biology , programming language
Landslide studies are now heavily reliant upon geotechnical tools to detect and map, develop hazard zonation, monitor, and predict landslides. The use of remote sensing tools makes up a considerable portion of the inputs of these studies and often requires the selection of proper proxies to represent static variables in landslide dynamics. This article surveys a sampling of landslide studies to determine common practices in representing and measuring two static variables — soil properties and vegetative cover — in determining slope stability. It was determined that there exists a lack of remotely sensed datasets used to measure various soil properties in landslide studies. Findings also indicate that remotely sensed inputs measuring vegetative cover, which contributes to slope stability, are focused on the normalized difference vegetation index and/or land‐use/land‐cover classifications. Other, perhaps better‐suited, options do exist to apply remote sensing techniques to represent and measure the influence of soil properties and vegetative cover upon slope stability. New tools are needed in applying remote sensing techniques for the measurement of soil degradation in landslide‐prone areas, and modifications to existing vegetation‐mapping methods must be made to improve the quality of landslide studies going forward.