Anatoly Gitelson

• Doctor of Philosophy
• Emeritus Professor at University of Nebraska–Lincoln

The amount of absorbed light is one of the main factors governing plant photosynthesis, and ultimately, the gross primary production (GPP) of vegetation. Since canopy chlorophyll (Chl) content defines the amount of light that can be absorbed (thus the amount of energy available for photosynthesis), it is representative of the status of the photosyn...

Environmental stresses on plants are among the major limitations to crop productivity. Plants are naturally equipped with a set of acclimatory mechanisms enabling them to withstand stresses without irreversible damage. Here, we overhauled the approach to non-invasive gauging of the response of maize to combined drought and highlight stresses. This...

Rice (Oryza sativa L.) is the most important staple crop feeding more than half of the world’s population. Extensive effort currently undertaken to develop new and improve existing rice cultivars calls for high-throughput, ideally non-invasive methods for monitoring the phenology and performance of rice plants in the field. We report on the results...

The development of algorithms for remote sensing of water quality (RSWQ) requires a large amount of in situ data to account for the bio-geo-optical diversity of inland and coastal waters. The GLObal Reflectance community dataset for Imaging and optical sensing of Aquatic environments (GLORIA) includes 7,572 curated hyperspectral remote sensing refl...

The green leaf area index (GLAI) has been widely used in agriculture, forestry, and environmental sciences for the analysis and modeling of many biophysical processes of vegetation, including the attenuation of light through the canopy, transpiration, photosynthesis, and carbon and nutrient cycles. Nevertheless, its usefulness is hampered by the un...

Non-invasive comparative analysis of the spectral composition of energy absorbed by crop species at leaf and plant levels was carried out using the absorption coefficient retrieved from leaf and plant reflectance as an informative metric. In leaves of three species with contrasting leaf structures and photosynthetic pathways (maize, soybean, and ri...

Absorption of radiation in the photosynthetically active radiation (PAR) region is significantly influenced by plant biochemistry, structural properties, and photosynthetic pathway. To understand and quantify the effects of these traits on absorbed PAR it is necessary to develop practical and reliable tools that are sensitive to these traits. Using...

Surface reflectance data acquired in red and near-infrared spectra by remote sensing sensors are traditionally applied to construct various vegetation indices (VIs), which are related to vegetation biophysical parameters. Most VIs use pre-defined weights (usually equal to 1) for the red and NIR reflectance values, therefore constraining particular...

p>The following authors were omitted from the original version of this Data Descriptor: Markus Reichstein and Nicolas Vuichard. Both contributed to the code development and N. Vuichard contributed to the processing of the ERA-Interim data downscaling. Furthermore, the contribution of the co-author Frank Tiedemann was re-evaluated relative to the co...

With current and upcoming imaging spectrometers, automated band analysis techniques are needed to enable efficient identification of most informative bands to facilitate optimized processing of spectral data into estimates of biophysical variables. This paper introduces an automated spectral band analysis tool (BAT) based on Gaussian processes regr...

Climate change can impose large offsets between the seasonal cycle of photosynthesis and that in solar radiation and temperature which drive it. Ecophysiological adjustments to such offsets in forests growing under hot and dry conditions are critical for maintaining carbon uptake and survival. Here, we investigate the adjustments that underlie the...

The absorption of Photosynthetically Active Radiation (PAR) by different foliar pigments defines the amount of energy available for photosynthesis and also the need for photoprotection. Both characteristics reveal essential information about productivity, development, and stress acclimation of plants. Here we present an approach for the estimation...

The FLUXNET2015 dataset provides ecosystem-scale data on CO2, water, and energy exchange between the biosphere and the atmosphere, and other meteorological and biological measurements, from 212 sites around the globe (over 1500 site-years, up to and including year 2014). These sites, independently managed and operated, voluntarily contributed their...

The FLUXNET2015 dataset provides ecosystem-scale data on CO2, water, and energy exchange between the biosphere and the atmosphere, and other meteorological and biological measurements, from 212 sites around the globe (over 1500 site-years, up to and including year 2014). These sites, independently managed and operated, voluntarily contributed their...

Changes of chlorophyll (Chl) and carotenoid (Car) contents and their ratio (Car/Chl) represent a sensitive indicator of vegetation photosynthetic activity, developmental changes, and stress responses. The goal of this study was to design methods for estimating Car/Chl in plants across species, seasonal changes and ontogenetic phases requiring no sp...

The FLUXNET2015 dataset provides ecosystem-scale data on CO2, water, and energy exchange between the biosphere and the atmosphere, and other meteorological and biological measurements, from 212 sites around the globe (over 1500 site-years, up to and including year 2014). These sites, independently managed and operated, voluntarily contributed their...

Gross primary production (GPP) is a measure for crop productivity, indicating yield and expressing C exchange of agro‐ecosystems. A multitude of satellite sensors at varying spatial and spectral resolution brings a possibility to use remotely sensed data for regional and global GPP estimation. More work is still needed to develop algorithms for GPP...

The light absorption coefficient of vegetation is related to the content and composition of pigments in the plant canopy. It is a useful metric for understanding the spatial and temporal dynamics of the absorbed solar radiation, photosynthetic capacity, and productivity of vegetation. Still, its estimation in vivo is challenging due to the large va...

Agriculture faces the challenge of providing food, fibre and energy from limited land resources to satisfy the changing needs of a growing world population. Global megatrends, e.g., climate change, influence environmental production factors; production and consumption thus must be continuously adjusted to maintain the producer–consumer-equilibrium...

The objective of this study is to develop generic algorithm for estimating fraction of radiation absorbed by photosynthetically active vegetation not requiring parameterization for C3 and C4 crops, maize and soybean, with contrasting photosynthetic pathways, canopy architectures and leaf structures. The study based on data acquired during eight yea...

We present here results that demonstrate the potential of the recently launched Ocean and Land Colour Instrument (OLCI) onboard the satellite Sentinel-3A to deliver accurate estimates of chlorophyll-a (chl-a) concentration in coastal waters using reflectances in the red and near-infrared (NIR) spectral regions. Two-band and three-band NIR-red model...

The goal of this study is to quantify variability of daily light use efficiency (LUE) based on radiation absorbed by photosynthetically active vegetation (LUEgreen) in C3 and C4 crops. Data contained GPP, fAPAR, total and green leaf area index taken over 16 site years of irrigated and rainfed maize and 8 site years of soybean in 2001–2008 including...

An important aspect of precision horticulture methodology is comprised by on-line monitoring of apple crop load, gauging fruit expansion, and estimating the extent and the rate of ripening. Remote monitoring based on multi- and hyperspectral imaging is a powerful tool for solving this problem. Still, its potential is often limited by insufficient u...

Established reflectance-based approaches for estimation of foliar pigment contents assume close relationship between leaf absorbance and reflectance. Complex organization and high pigment content of leaves may lead to violation of the essential assumptions under Kubleka-Munk theory relating reflectance and absorbance. We compared relationships of a...

Inland and coastal waterbodies are critical components of the global biosphere. Timely monitoring is necessary to enhance our understanding of their functions, the drivers impacting on these functions and to deliver more effective management. The ability to observe waterbodies from space has led to Earth observation (EO) becoming established as an...

This dataset contains foliar reflectance spectra and corresponding pigment contents for Aesculus hippocastanum, Fagus silvatica, Acer platanoides published widely. The leaves were collected at Lomonosov MSU (Russia) and in Karlsrhue Univ. park (Germany). For more detail, see [1] M. Merzlyak, A. Gitelson, Why and what for the leaves are yellow in a...

Foliar pigment contents and composition are main factors governing absorbed photosynthetically active radiation, photosynthetic activity, and physiological status of vegetation. In this study the performance of nondestructive techniques based on leaf reflectance were tested for estimating chlorophyll (Chl) and anthocyanin (AnC) contents in species...

Flavonoids are a ubiquitous multifunctional group of phenolics of paramount importance for the terrestrial plants involved in protection from biotic and abiotic stresses, color and chemical signaling and other functions. Deciphering of in situ absorption of foliar Flv is important but was thought to be impossible due to a strong overlap with other...

This dataset contains foliar reflectance spectra and corresponding values of key pigment contents for Cornus alba, Parthenocissus quinquefolia, Corylus avellana, Acer platanoides published widely. The leaves were collected at MSU and in US. For more detail, see [1] M. Merzlyak, A. Gitelson, Why and what for the leaves are yellow in autumn? On the...

Bio-optical Modeling and Remote Sensing of Inland Waters presents the latest developments, state-of-the-art, and future perspectives of bio-optical modeling for each optically active component of inland waters, providing a broad range of applications of water quality monitoring using remote sensing. Rather than discussing optical radiometry theorie...

Inland waters are important providers of ecological, environmental, hydrological, and socioeconomic services to mankind. Due to several advantages, remote sensing techniques have been frequently used to monitor inland waters worldwide. This area of remote sensing research has been intensively developed in the last 30 years primarily using the conce...

Leaf pigments provide valuable information about plant physiology. High resolution monitoring of their dynamics will give access to better understanding of processes occurring at different scales, and will be particularly important for ecologists, farmers, and decision makers to assess the influence of climate change on plant functions, and the ada...

With current and upcoming imaging spectrometers, automated band analysis techniques are needed to enable efficient identification of most informative bands to facilitate optimized processing of spectral data into estimates of biophysical variables. This contribution introduces an automated spectral band analysis tool (BAT) based on Gaussian process...

Informative spectral bands for green leaf area index (LAI) estimation in two crops were identified and generic models for soybean and maize were developed and validated using spectral data taken at close range. The objective of this paper was to test developed models using Aqua and Terra MODIS, Landsat TM and ETM+, ENVISAT MERIS surface reflectance...

Canopy chlorophyll content (Chl) closely relates to plant photosynthetic capacity, nitrogen status and productivity. The goal of this study is to develop remote sensing techniques for accurate estimation of canopy Chl during the entire growing season without re-parameterization of algorithms for two contrasting crop species, maize and soybean. Thes...

The goal of this study was to explore the relationships between stand-level photochemical reflectance index (PRI) and canopy structure/pigment pools, as well as light use efficiency (LUE) of photosynthetically active vegetation focusing on seasonal or ontogenetic time frames. PRI was originally designed as a means of assessing the xanthophyll cycle...

The goal of this study was to explore the relationships between the photochemical reflectance index (PRI) at the leaf level and pigment pools, focusing on the constitutive role of pigments in influencing PRI over seasonal or ontogenetic time frames. The purpose was to re-evaluate the role of PRI as an indicator of seasonally shifting pigment (chlor...

Canopy chlorophyll content (CCC) is an essential ecophysiological variable for photosynthetic functioning. Remote sensing of CCC is vital for a wide range of ecological and agricultural applications. The objectives of this study were to explore simple and robust algorithms for spectral assessment of CCC. Hyperspectral datasets for six vegetation ty...

One of the main factors affecting vegetation productivity is absorbed light, which is largely governed by chlorophyll. In this paper, we introduce the concept of chlorophyll efficiency, representing the amount of gross primary production per unit of canopy chlorophyll content (Chl) and incident PAR. We analyzed chlorophyll efficiency in two contras...

Green leaf area index (LAI) provides insight into the productivity, physiological and phenological status of vegetation. Measurement of spectral reflectance offers a fast, nondestructive estimation of green LAI. A number of methods have been used for estimation of green LAI; however, the specific spectral bands employed varied widely among the meth...

This study utilized a leaf color chart (LCC) to characterize the variation in leaf chlorophyll and estimate canopy chlorophyll in maize (Zea mays). The LCC consisted of four levels of greenness and was used to sort maize leaves in 2011 for three fields near Mead, Nebraska, USA. Leaf chlorophyll content for each color chart class was determined usin...

Leaf chlorophyll content (Chll) may serve as an observational proxy for the maximum rate of carboxylation (Vmax), which describes leaf photosynthetic capacity and represents the single most important control on modeled leaf photosynthesis within most Terrestrial Biosphere Models (TBMs). The parameterization of Vmax is associated with great uncertai...

This study developed a set of algorithms for satellite mapping of green leaf area index (LAI) in C3 and C4 crops. In situ hyperspectral reflectance and green LAI data, collected across eight years (2001-2008) at three AmeriFlux sites in Nebraska USA over irrigated and rain-fed maize and soybean, were used for algorithm development. The hyperspectra...

The applicability of algorithms for estimation of phycocyanin (PC) concentration based on light spectral reflectance heavily depends on the specific absorption of the pigment. But the determination of PC-specific absorption coefficient is not a straightforward task, as PC optical activity is overlapped by absorption of chlorophylls. The aim of our...

Recent studies have shown that estimates of leaf chlorophyll content (Chl), defined as the combined mass of chlorophyll a and chlorophyll b per unit leaf area, can be useful for constraining estimates of canopy light use efficiency (LUE). Canopy LUE describes the amount of carbon assimilated by a vegetative canopy for a given amount of absorbed pho...

Recent studies in Amazonian tropical evergreen forests using the Multi-angle Imaging SpectroRadiometer (MISR) and the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) have highlighted the importance of considering the view-illumination geometry in satellite data analysis. However, contrary to the observed for evergreen forests, bidirectional e...

Vegetation productivity metrics such as gross primary production (GPP) at the canopy scale are greatly affected by the efficiency of using absorbed radiation for photosynthesis, or light use efficiency (LUE). Thus, close investigation of the relationships between canopy GPP and photosynthetically active radiation absorbed by vegetation is the basis...

Leaf area index (LAI) and leaf chlorophyll content (Chll) represent key biophysical and biochemical controls on water, energy and carbon exchange processes in the terrestrial biosphere. In combination, LAI and Chll provide critical information on vegetation density, vitality and photosynthetic potentials.However, simultaneous retrieval of LAI and C...

Recent studies have shown that estimates of leaf chlorophyll content (Chl), defined as the combined mass of chlorophyll a and chlorophyll b per unit leaf area, can be useful for constraining estimates of canopy light-use-efficiency (LUE). Canopy LUE describes the amount of carbon assimilated by a vegetative canopy for a given amount of Absorbed Pho...

Photosynthesis simulations by terrestrial biosphere models are usually based on the Farquhar's model, in which the maximum rate of carboxylation (Vcmax ) is a key control parameter of photosynthetic capacity. Even though Vcmax is known to vary substantially in space and time in response to environmental controls, it is typically parameterized in mo...

Annual variation of U.S. corn production is an important matter of world concern. To assure immediate response to large-scale harvest failure in crop exporting regions, as was the case during the severe U.S. drought in 2012, and to enhance global food security, a practical crop growth monitoring system based on satellite data is required. This stud...

Great care is needed to obtain spectral data appropriate for phenotyping in a scientifically rigorous manner. This paper discusses the procedures and considerations necessary and also suggests important pre-processing and analytical steps leading to real-time, non-destructive assessment of crop biophysical characteristics. The system has three majo...

Leaf and canopy nitrogen (N) status relates strongly to leaf and canopy chlorophyll (Chl) content. Remote sensing is a tool that has the potential to assess N content at leaf, plant, field, regional and global scales. In this study, remote sensing techniques were applied to estimate N and Chl contents of irrigated maize (Zea mays L.) fertilized at...

We present here results that demonstrate the potential of near-infrared (NIR)–red models to estimate chlorophyll-a (chl-a) concentration in coastal waters using data from the spaceborne Hyperspectral Imager for the Coastal Ocean (HICO). Since the recent demise of the MEdium Resolution Imaging Spectrometer (MERIS), the use of sensors such as HICO ha...

Real-time monitoring of crop vegetation fraction and identification of development stages provides useful information for crop management. Using sensors at close range makes it possible to collect data with very high temporal resolution. This study used four-band radiometers with green, red, red edge, and near infrared spectral bands for daily moni...

Many algorithms have been developed for the remote estimation of vegetation fraction in terms of combinations of spectral bands, derivatives of reflectance spectra, neural networks, inversion of radiative transfer models, and several multispectral statistical approaches. The most widespread type of algorithm used is the mathematical combination of...

In terrestrial biosphere models, key biochemical controls on carbon uptake by vegetation canopies are typically assigned fixed literature-based values for broad categories of vegetation types although in reality significant spatial and temporal variability exists. Satellite remote sensing can support modeling efforts by offering distributed informa...

A crop yield estimation model using time-series MODIS WDRVI was developed. The main feature of the proposed model is the incorporation of crop phenology detection using MODIS data, called the "Shape-Model Fitting Method". MODIS WDRVI taken 7-10 days before the corn silking stage had strong linear correlation with corn final grain yield at both fiel...

Sentinel-2 is planned for launch in 2014 by the European Space Agency and it is equipped with the Multi Spectral Instrument (MSI), which will provide images with high spatial, spectral and temporal resolution. It covers the VNIR/SWIR spectral region in 13 bands and incorporates two new spectral bands in the red-edge region, which can be used to der...

In this study, a simple model was developed to estimate crop gross primary productivity (GPP) using a product of chlorophyll-related vegetation index, retrieved from MODIS 250 m data, and potential photosynthetically active radiation (PAR). Potential PAR is incident photosynthetically active radiation under a condition of minimal atmospheric aeroso...

Remote sensing offers a unique perspective of plant vigor based on reflectance of the crops' canopy. The goal of this study was to determine how deep into the maize canopy red-edge chlorophyll index, CIred edge, was affected by foliar chlorophyll (Chl) content and leaf area. Reflectance in the range 400 to 900 nm was measured at both the leaf and c...

Vegetation indices (VIs), traditionally used for estimation of green leaf area index (gLAI), have different sensitivities along the range of gLAI variability. The goals of this study were to: (i) test 12 VIs for estimating gLAI in maize (Zea mays L.) and soybean [Glycine max (L.) Merr.]; (ii) estimate gLAI in both crops without the need to reparame...

The seasonal patterns of green leaf area index (GLAI) can be used to assess crop physiological and phenological status, to assess yield potential, and to incorporate in crop simulation models. This study focused on examining the potential capabilities and limitations of satellite data retrieved from the moderate resolution imaging spectroradiometer...

In this study, an inexpensive camera-observation system called the Crop Phenology Recording System (CPRS), which consists of a standard digital color camera (RGB cam) and a modified near-infrared (NIR) digital camera (NIR cam), was applied to estimate green leaf area index (LAI), total LAI, green leaf biomass and total dry biomass of stalks and lea...

Crop physiological and phenological status is an important factor that characterizes crop yield as well as carbon exchange between the atmosphere and the terrestrial biosphere in agroecosystems. It is difficult to establish high frequency observations of crop status in multiple locations using conventional approaches such as agronomical sampling an...

The research attempts to develop a new methodological approach to analyze and interpret satellite data for emergent wetland/marshland. We intend to retrieve salt-marsh biophysical characteristics, such as leaf area index, canopy level chlorophyll, vegetation fraction, and above ground green biomass, in the Gulf of Mexico, using NASA's Moderate Reso...

Vegetation indices (VIs), traditionally used for estimation of green leaf area index (gLAI), have different sensitivities along the range of gLAI variability. The goals of this study were to: (1) test twelve VIs for estimating maize and soybean gLAI; (2) estimate gLAI in both crops without the need to re-parameterize the model for different crops;...

We present here results supporting the use of Medium Resolution Imaging Spectrometer (MERIS)-based Near Infrared-Red algorithms for estimating chlorophyll-a (chl-a) concentration in complex coastal waters. The objective of the study was to test the potential of universal applicability of NIR-Red algorithms, calibrated with (a) radiometric measureme...

Sentinel-2 is planned for launch in 2013 and it is equipped with the Multi Spectral Instrument (MSI), which will provide images with high spatial, spectral and temporal resolution. It incorporates two new spectral bands in the red-edge region, which can be used to derive red-edge type of vegetation indices. These are particularly suitable for deriv...

Algorithms based on red and near infra-red (NIR) reflectances measured using field spectrometers have been previously shown to yield accurate estimates of chlorophyll-a concentration in turbid productive waters, irrespective of variations in the bio-optical characteristics of water. The objective of this study was to investigate the performance of...