Andreas Fries

Universidad Técnica Particular de Loja | UTPL · Departamento de Geología y Minas e Ingienería Civil, Section: Hidrological Resourses

Ecuador has the highest deforestation rate in South America, causing large-scale soil erosion. Inter-Andean watersheds are especially affected by a rapid increase of the population leading to the conversion of large areas of montane forest into pasture and cropland. In this study, we estimate soil erosion risk in a small mixed land-use watershed in...

The near surface humidity in a megadiverse mountain ecosystem in southern Ecuador is examined on the basis of Relative Humidity (RH) measurements inside the natural mountain forest and at open sites along an altitudinal gradient from 1700 to 3200 m. The main methodological aim of the current study is to generate a humidity regionalization tool to p...

The precise estimation of precipitation quantities in tropical mountain regions is in great demand by ecological and hydrological studies, due to the heterogeneity of the rainfall distribution and the lack of meteorological station data. This study uses radar images and ground station data to provide the required high-resolution precipitation maps....

The coastal regions of South Ecuador and Peru belong to the areas experiencing the strongest impact of the El Niño Southern Oscillation phenomenon. However, the impact and dynamic development of weather patterns during those events are not well understood, due to the sparse observational networks. In spite of neutral to cold conditions after the de...

Biodiversity and ecosystem functions are highly threatened by global change. It has been proposed that geodiversity can be used as an easy-to-measure surrogate of biodiversity to guide conservation management. However, so far, there is mixed evidence to what extent geodiversity can predict biodiversity and ecosystem functions at the regional scale...

Ground based rainfall information is hardly available in most high mountain areas of the world due to the remoteness and complex topography. Thus, proper understanding of spatio-temporal rainfall dynamics still remains a challenge in those areas. Satellite-based rainfall products may help if their rainfall assessment are of high quality. In this pa...

Few plant functional types (PFTs) with fixed average traits are used in land surface models (LSMs) to consider feedback between vegetation and the changing atmosphere. It is uncertain if highly diverse vegetation requires more local PFTs. Here, we analyzed how 52 tree species of a megadiverse mountain rain forest separate into local tree functional...

This study evaluated the effects of land-use change (L-UCH) on dung beetle community structure (Scarabaeinae) in a disturbed dry ecosystem in southern Ecuador. Five different L-UCH classes were analyzed by capturing the dung beetle species at each site using 120 pitfall traps in total. To determine dung beetle abundance and diversity at each L-UCH,...

Background: The impact of selective thinning on forest diversity has been extensively studied in temperate and boreal regions. However, in the tropics, knowledge is still poor regarding the impacts of this silvicultural treatment on functional diversity, especially in tropical mountain forests, which are considered to be highly biodiverse ecosystem...

The contingent valuation of water is one of the key components when wanting to implement proposals for integrated water management in mountain basins. Management of Hydrological Systems (MHS), is one of the great challenges that the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) currently demand. Mainly in mountain basins with fragile ecosystems that face st...

Integrated watershed management (IWM) is a priority, especially in semiarid regions that are concurrently affected by population growth, land use change, soil erosion, and poor governance. In developing countries, IWM is often done without any support tool, scientific data, or deep knowledge of territory characteristics. The aim of this study was t...

Water availability in semiarid regions is endangered, which is not only due to changing climate conditions, but also to anthropogenic land use changes. The present study analyzed the annual and monthly water balance (WBc) and the soil moisture deficit (Ds) for different vegetation units under semiarid conditions in the Andes of southern Ecuador, ba...

The prediction of river discharge using hydrological models (HMs) is of utmost importance, especially in basins that provide drinking water or serve as recreation areas, to mitigate damage to civil structures and to prevent the loss of human lives. Therefore, different HMs must be tested to determine their accuracy and usefulness as early warning t...

The degradation dynamics of lignin and cellulose were analyzed by means of a solid state biodegradation experiment, using residues from the essential oil extraction of the Palo Santo tree (Bursera graveolens). As such, two native Xylaria spp. and an exotic mushroom Trametes versicolor were incubated on the spent substrate (Residues of B. Graveolens...

The present investigation evaluates the accuracy of estimating above-ground biomass (AGB) by means of two different sensors installed onboard an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) platform (DJI Inspire I) because the high costs of very high-resolution imagery provided by satellites or light detection and ranging (LiDAR) sensors often impede AGB estimati...

Abstract: Research Highlights: This study determined that treatment “release from competitors” causes different reactions in selected timber species respective to diametrical growth, in which the initial size of the tree (diametric class) is important. Also, the growth habit and phenological traits (defoliation) of the species must be considered, w...

El análisis de la presión demográfica sobre los recursos hídricos es fundamental en la gestión sostenible del agua. En este trabajo se determinó el Índice de Presión Demográfica sobre el Agua (IPDA) para los 55 cantones más poblados del Ecuador, combinando cinco variables: distribución de la población, población en zonas áridas, consumo doméstico e...

El avance tecnológico a nivel mundial, conlleva al desarrollo de las sociedades, incrementando la demanda de energía eléctrica en los hogares. La energía producida actualmente es obtenida principalmente de combustibles fósiles, los cuales, aparte de no ser sustentables, contaminan el medio ambiente e incrementan la emisión de gases de efecto invern...

Research Highlights: The study determined that selective thinning causes different responses, the initial size of the tree released is an influential factor in the growth of species. The temporality of climate and physiological conditions of each species are influential in the growth. It is evident that the defoliation of certain species is an impo...

This paper focuses on the analysis of precipitation patterns, using a Local Area Weather Radar to collect information about the precipitation distribution in an Andean region of southern Ecuador (cities of Loja, Zamora and Catamayo). 54 representative events were selected to develop daily precipitation maps and to obtain their relevant characterist...

A reliable estimation of Above Ground Biomass (AGB) in Tropical Mountain Forest (TMF) is still complicated, due to fast-changing climate and topographic conditions, which modifies the forest structure within fine scales. The variations in vertical and horizontal forest structure are hardly detectable by small field plots, especially in natural TMF...

Geographic information in decision making often goes unnoticed, but it is actually very present in our daily activities. Our eBook Fundamentals of GIS: Applications with ArcGIS shows the potential of Geographic Information Systems (GIS) for geoprocessing and mapping using ArcGIS. This book is designed in a didactic and sequential way, as we advance...

This contribution presents techniques for the design of pressured irrigation systems oriented to shift operation, where the main focus is the minimization of the economic costs for the network distribution lines. The distribution line infrastructure implies the highest investment costs for an irrigation system compared to all other components. The...

La información geográfica en la toma de decisiones suele pasar desapercibida, pero en realidad se encuentra muy presente en nuestras actividades cotidianas. Nuestro libro electrónico Fundamentos de SIG: Aplicaciones con ArcGIS muestra el potencial de los Sistemas de Información Geográfica (SIG) para realizar geoprocesos y diseño de mapas usando Arc...

Weather radar networks are indispensable tools for forecasting and disaster prevention in industrialized countries. However, they are far less common in countries of South America, which frequently suffer from an underdeveloped network of meteorological stations. To address this problem in southern Ecuador, this article presents a novel radar netwo...

Fruits of Palo Santo (Bursera graveolens) are used for essential oil extraction. The extraction process is very efficient, because up to 3% of the fresh fruits can be transformed into essential oil; however, a considerable amount of waste is concurrently produced (>97% of the fresh biomass). Recent developments in Ecuadorian policies to foster envi...

Human activities during the last decades provoked a notable reduction in global forest cover. Knowing that forest stands act as stock and sinks for carbon and other greenhouse gases, it is important to determine the existing forest cover at country level and to calculate annual deforestation rates. This work uses NOAA satellite images in a resoluti...

Understanding soil erosion processes in the Ecuadorian Andes with a tropical wet-dry climate and a variable topography, is fundamental for research on agriculture sustainable, environmental management, as well as for a stable water supply for the local populations. This work proposes method to estimate soil erosion risk in the semiarid Catamayo bas...

Increased concentrations of atmospheric greenhouse gases have stimulated discussions about the importance and the potential of forests for carbon (C) sinks. To assess the amount of carbon in forests it is necessary to have reliable measurements or estimations of biomass content. To estimate the biomass of a forest, the density of tree stamps is an...

This paper describes a method of low-altitude remote sensing in combination with in situ measurements (leaf area, spectroscopy, and position) to monitor the postfire canopy recovery of two competing grassland species. The method was developed in the Andes of Ecuador, where a tethered balloon with a digital camera was deployed to record a time serie...

To better understand the mechanisms behind maintenance of the extraordinary plant and fungal diversity in tropical mountain forests we applied, for the first time, network theory to investigate the mycobiont-plant communities. We addressed three different mycorrhizal classes, arbuscular mycorrhizae of tropical trees, mycorrhizae of terrestrial and...

The natural regulation of the water cycle by tropical montane forests is an important ecosystem service. Within this chapter we focus on water balance and regulation of the water cycle. Differences of rainfall-runoff generation across scales change from a near-surface event water driven system in pristine rainforest-covered micro-catchments to a mo...

The thermal structure of a megadiverse mountain ecosystem in southern Ecuador is examined on the basis of temperature measurements inside the natural mountain forest and at open-sites along an altitudinal gradient from 1600 to 3200 m. The main methodological aim of the current study is to develop in air temperature regionalization tool to provide s...