Irene Marzolff

Irene Marzolff
Goethe University Frankfurt · Institut für Physische Geographie

Dr. rer. nat., MSc, Dipl.-Ing. (FH)

About

120
Publications
27,638
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Introduction
I am a physical geographer and remote sensing/GIS scientist-cum-lecturer at Goethe University, Frankfurt am Main. I have been working on high-resolution remote sensing methods for studying land degradation and erosion since 1995, with a strong focus on unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), small format aerial photography (SFAP) and low-altitude photogrammetry for monitoring. You may find further information on my website: http://www.uni-frankfurt.de/46055652/marzolff

Publications

Publications (120)
Article
Full-text available
Southeastern Europe is home to remnants of highly diverse open ecosystems, including grasslands and forest-steppe. To understand the impacts of climate changes, fire disturbance, and herbivory on forest-grassland coexistence in this region, we integrated new and published paleoecological data from two sedimentary records in southeastern Romania wit...
Conference Paper
Full-text available
The highly dissected morphology of the Chambal badlands characterizes the Lower Chambal Valley in Madhya Pradesh, Central India. It is considered the heaviest form of land degradation through gully erosion in the entire country and ranges among the largest badland zones in the world. In order to combat the loss of land and decline in agricultural p...
Article
Full-text available
The argan woodlands of South Morocco represent an open-canopy dryland forest with traditional silvopastoral usage that includes browsing by goats, sheep and camels, oil production as well as agricultural use. In the past, these forests have undergone extensive clearing, but are now protected by the state. However, the remaining argan woodlands are...
Article
Full-text available
Monitoring woody cover by remote sensing is considered a key methodology towards sustainable management of trees in dryland forests. However, while modern very high resolution satellite (VHRS) sensors allow woodland mapping at the individual tree level, the historical perspective is often hindered by lack of appropriate image data. In this first st...
Chapter
This is the first chapter of the book "UAVs for the Environmental Sciences" (edited by Eltner et al. 2022) - see also project https://www.researchgate.net/project/Unmanned-Aerial-Vehicles-in-Environmental-Sciences-Principles-Developments-and-Applications . The full book may be found open access for download on https://www.wbg-wissenverbindet.de/sh...
Article
Full-text available
The endemic argan tree (Argania spinosa) populations in southern Morocco are highly degraded due to overbrowsing, illegal firewood extraction and the expansion of intensive agriculture. Bare areas between the isolated trees increase due to limited regrowth; however, it is unknown if the trees influence the soil of the intertree areas. Hypotheticall...
Article
Full-text available
Non‐forest ecosystems, dominated by shrubs, grasses and herbaceous plants, provide ecosystem services including carbon sequestration and forage for grazing, and are highly sensitive to climatic changes. Yet these ecosystems are poorly represented in remotely sensed biomass products and are undersampled by in situ monitoring. Current global change t...
Preprint
Full-text available
The endemic argan tree (Argania spinosa) populations in South Morocco are highly degraded due to overbrowsing, illegal firewood extraction and the expansion of intensive agriculture. Bare areas between the isolated trees increase due to limited regrowth, but show lower soil quality than their neighbouring tree areas. Hypothetically, spatial differe...
Article
Full-text available
The endemic argan woodlands cover large parts of South Morocco and create a characteristic landscape with areas of sparsely vegetated and bare soil surfaces between the single trees. This unique ecosystem has been under extensive agrosilvopastoral management for centuries and is now at risk of degradation caused by overgrazing and increasing scarci...
Preprint
Full-text available
Non-forest ecosystems, dominated by shrubs, grasses and herbaceous plants, provide ecosystem services including carbon sequestration and forage for grazing, yet are highly sensitive to climatic changes. Yet these ecosystems are poorly represented in remotely-sensed biomass products and are undersampled by in-situ monitoring. Current global change t...
Article
Full-text available
The endemic argan tree (Argania spinosa) populations in South Morocco are highly degraded due to their use as a biomass resource in dry years and illegal firewood extraction. The intensification and expansion of agricultural land lead to a retreat of the wooded area, while the remaining argan open woodlands are often overgrazed. Thus, canopy-covere...
Chapter
How an object appears in an aerial photograph depends on the way in which it is illuminated by the sun and the position of the camera relative to the object and sun. This gives rise to multiview-angle reflectance and the bidirectional reflectance distribution function (BRDF) within the solar plane. Small-format aerial photography (SFAP) represents...
Chapter
A successful small-format aerial photography (SFAP) field survey often depends on the ability to react flexibly to more-or-less predictable complications. Considerable planning may be necessary for international travel and operation to make sure that SFAP equipment and personnel may reach the study site at the desirable time of day or year. Local s...
Chapter
Vineyards represent a special type of cultivation for several reasons. Large differences in land relief, many different forms of growing and cultivation, as well as climatic prerequisites and their current change are the specific features. Cultivation area will expand worldwide, and cultivation regions will shift. The particular situation of the se...
Chapter
Geomorphology is the study of the Earth’s surface landforms; it deals with morphology, processes, landforms, origins, and ages. Aerial photography has long been utilized to illustrate, describe, interpret, map, and measure diverse types of landforms. Small-format aerial photography is particularly useful for portraying landform details both in vert...
Chapter
The aerial photographer must be cognizant of local rules and regulations for flying and taking small-format aerial photographs. Regulations vary considerably from country to country for types of aircraft, flying height, survey location, and other issues related to SFAP. Restrictions range from none or few, to special requirements, or even outright...
Chapter
The characteristics and suitability of different camera types available for small-format aerial photography (SFAP) along with recommended settings are discussed in this chapter. Digital cameras have largely replaced earlier analog (film) cameras; mirrorless interchangeable-lens, compact point-and-shoot, and integrated on-board quadcopter drone came...
Chapter
Outdoor recreational activities and sports take up an increasing amount of time and human effort at sites ranging from more-or-less natural environments to highly altered landscapes. In nearly all cases, small-format aerial photography would be valuable for both users and managers of such recreational venues. Aerial imagery provides for detailed si...
Chapter
Photogrammetry comprises techniques concerned with making measurements of real-world objects and terrain features from images. Applications include the measuring of coordinates, quantification of distances, heights, areas, and volumes, 3D topographic mapping, the extraction of 3D point clouds for surface reconstructions, and the generation of digit...
Chapter
Architecture is the design and construction of all types of buildings and integrated building complexes. Archaeology, in contrast, deals with the physical evidence of past human activities as preserved in architectural ruins and artifacts. Cemeteries combine architectural and archaeologic components with remains of human bodies. Small-format aerial...
Chapter
Numerous image-processing techniques may be applied to small-format aerial photography. Geometric correction and georeferencing are a prerequisite for most measurement and monitoring applications. Image enhancement may improve the visual appearance of the image and emphasize its most important aspects with respect to the research question. New data...
Chapter
Small-format aerial photography (SFAP) has a great variety in terms of aircraft and camera systems. However, some basic aspects, which are introduced in this chapter, are common to all approaches. The range of viewing angles from high-oblique to vertical vantages facilitates depicting a study area in its broader landscape context as well as in map-...
Chapter
Wetlands include myriad environmental types as defined by water, hydric soils, and specialized vegetation. Wetland environments are present in all climatic and topographic settings around the world. Much scientific research is directed toward wetlands, and small-format aerial photography has distinct advantages for certain types of wetland investig...
Chapter
Photographic composition involves the subjective reaction of people to the image based on the artistic characteristics of the photograph. This subject is rarely treated in technical books on aerial photography; nonetheless, good image composition may make the difference between a merely useful visual recording and a compelling image that immediatel...
Chapter
Gully erosion constitutes the most severe form of soil erosion in arid and semiarid landscapes. Illustrated by selected examples, this chapter gives an overview of gully-erosion studies employing small-format aerial photography (SFAP) at > 30 sites during the last 25 years. 2D and 3D change quantification based on the detailed maps and DEMs provide...
Chapter
Diverse types of flying machines may be adapted for small-format aerial photography including manned and unmanned aircraft of all types. Manned platforms include single-engine airplanes, helicopters, autogyros, gliders, and ultralight aircraft. These are generally large, expensive, and require trained pilots for operation. Unmanned aircraft for SFA...
Chapter
Visual interpretation of aerial photographs is based on recognition of objects, which often takes place without any conscious effort by the interpreter. Basic features that aid in the examination and interpretation of airphotos are color, shape, size and height, shadow, pattern, texture, and context. Stereoscopic viewing offers additional possibili...
Chapter
Small-format aerial photography has grown from a niche activity in the late 20th century to a mainstream enterprise in the early 21st century. Several technologies and social developments facilitated this rapid growth, namely digital cameras, airborne platforms, GNSS, Internet, mobile phones, batteries, 3D photogrammetry, and legal aspects. Among v...
Chapter
The interrelationship of vegetation cover and growth-habit forms with soil-erosion processes is one of the most exciting issues of society-environment interaction because of small-scale and short-term changes, which are beyond conventional earth observation. Based on examples of the authors’ research, interactions of agrarian land-use systems and t...
Chapter
Innovations for cameras and platforms have led to new scientific, commercial, and artistic possibilities for acquiring dramatic aerial photographs in the early 21st century. This book deals with small-format aerial photography (SFAP) with an emphasis on unmanned aircraft flown at low height (< 300 m). SFAP today employs light-weight digital cameras...
Chapter
The generation of electricity from wind energy has grown rapidly during the past two decades, particularly in Asia, Europe, and North America. The windscape represents the combination of local climate and geography, environmental and ecological conditions, mix of public policies, and human land use and infrastructure associated with harnessing wind...
Chapter
Unmanned aerial systems (UAS), also called unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), remotely piloted aircraft systems (RPAS) or drones, have become the prevalent means of taking SFAP from low heights in the geosciences as well as in many other geospatial applications and research disciplines. This chapter gives a comprehensive overview of fixed-wing, multi...
Chapter
This preface may be viewed at https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/B9780128129425099973
Article
Gully and badland erosion constitute important land‐degradation processes with severe on‐site and off‐site effects above all in sedimentary deposits and alluvial soils of the arid and semi‐arid regions. Agricultural use of the affected land is impeded both by the irreversible loss of topsoil and the morphological dissection of the terrain. In vario...
Article
Full-text available
Open Access Link: http://doi.org/10.18172/cig.3206 Geomorphological relief units are related to certain processes and the history of their development. They are well defined by form and material. This study investigates erosion processes on different relief units. Rainfall simulations, rill experiments and monitoring by aerial photography were per...
Research
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Poster presented at the Deutsche Kongress für Geographie (DKG) 2015, Berlin
Research
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Poster presented at the European Geosciences Union (EGU) General Assembly 2015, Vienna
Article
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This study aims at the detection of gully-affected areas by applying object-based image analysis in the region of Taroudannt, Morocco, which is highly affected by gully erosion while simultaneously representing a major region of agro-industry with a high demand of arable land. As high-resolution optical satellite data are readily available from var...
Conference Paper
Full-text available
Gully erosion is one major issue in soil erosion and land degradation. This major soil degradation process has affected the Souss Basin, located between the High and the Anti-Atlas, historically, and is increasing nowadays again. Since the 16th century, related to the production of sugar cane, gullies have been incising into the sedimentary fans an...
Chapter
Cada unidad geomorfológica está ligada a una combinación de procesos que llevaron a formarla. Se caracteriza por formas y substratos determinados. El estudio aquí presentado investiga si en estas diferentes unidades de relieve se pueden identificar también diferentes procesos reinantes. Por ello se han recopilado datos de mediciones de erosión y ex...
Article
Full-text available
The Souss depression is wedged between the High Atlas to the north and the Anti-Atlas to the south. It corresponds to the south atlasic path and opens on the Atlantic Ocean. It is drained by the Souss wadi which flows into the ocean. This depression extends over 160 km in length from east to west and 40 km wide from north to south, its greatest ext...
Article
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Since the 16th century with the rise and fall of sugar production, the Souss basin, situated between High and Anti-Atlas, is affected by gully erosion due to the deforestation of Argan trees. Nowadays, it is one of the most intensive agricultural regions of Morocco. On its sedimentary fans and alluvial terraces, a very dynamic land use change is go...
Chapter
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The Southern Urals are one of Eurasia's most important regions, marking the natural boundary between Europe and Asia. This geographical position surely played an essential role in stimulating the area's active involvement in early processes of cultural and social developments that occurred, in particular, in the steppe and forest-steppe. This appli...
Data
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Supplementary Figure 1: The body scheme, that was used by the subjects to sketch their sensations during laser acupuncture. The arrow heads mark the points of stimulation. Supplementary Figure 2: Methodological approach to measure distances from a cohort of meridians. The left picture shows the variability of different sources concerning the course...
Article
Full-text available
This article presents an environmental remote sensing application using a UAV that is specifically aimed at reducing the data gap between field scale and satellite scale in soil erosion monitoring in Morocco. A fixed-wing aircraft type Sirius I (MAVinci, Germany) equipped with a digital system camera (Panasonic) is employed. UAV surveys are conduct...
Article
Full-text available
The study of acupuncture-related sensations, like deqi and propagated sensations along channels (PSCs), has a long tradition in acupuncture basic research. The phenomenon itself, however, remains poorly understood. To study the connection between PSC and classical meridians, we applied a geographic information system (GIS) to analyze sketches of ac...
Article
Full-text available
The usage of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) for monitoring purposes has strongly increased in the last couple of years. The high potential of UAVs lies in the variety of installable sensors for data acquisition as well as in their quite easy handling. In this work, a monitoring scheme for investigating soil erosion (i.e. gully erosion) in the Sous...
Article
Full-text available
For the analysis of gullies as one type of landform this work presents an approach using small format aerial photographs derived from field campaigns with an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) in the Souss Basin, Morocco. Since many existing gullies are neighboring agro-industrial as well as settlement areas the investigation of current gully developmen...
Article
Full-text available
The Souss basin is characterised by high population dynamics and changing land use. Extensive plantations of citrus fruits, bananas and vegetables in monocropping, mainly for the European market, replace the traditional mixed agriculture with small-area olive orchards and cereal fields. A precipitation of around 200 mm enforces the irrigation of cu...
Article
This study investigates how medium-term gully-development data differ from short-term data, and which factors influence their spatial and temporal variability at nine selected actively retreating bank gullies situated in four Spanish basin landscapes. Small-format aerial photographs using unmanned, remote-controlled platforms were taken at the gull...
Article
Full-text available
Piping is one of the geomorphologic processes that are most difficult to quantify, because it can hardly be examined by conventional field survey methods and just as little by most remote sensing methods. Bridging the resolution gap between terres-trial and conventional aerial photography, small-format aerial photography taken by unmanned platforms...
Article
Full-text available
This study investigates how medium-term gully-development data differ from short-term data, and which factors are responsible for their spatial and temporal variability. Eight actively retreating bank gullies situated in Spanish basin landscapes were monitored for up to 11 years with high-resolution aerial photographs using unmanned remote-controll...
Article
PLEASE NOTE: This publication entry is a recurring Research Gate artifact with misnamed first author. Please refer to the correct version of this book on RG, authored by James S. Aber et al., or to the second edition of this book (Small-Format Aerial Photography and UAS Imagery), for which the individual chapters may also be found on RG. xxxxxxxxx...
Chapter
Photogrammetry comprises all techniques concerned with making measurements of real-world objects and terrain features from images. These may be aerial as well as terrestrial images, and they may be taken by film cameras, digital cameras or electronic scanners on tripods, airborne or spaceborne platforms. Applications include the measuring of coordi...
Chapter
This chapter discusses glacial geomorphology. Geomorphology is the study of the Earth's surficial landforms both on land and on the seafloor. Glacial deposits underlie many notable landforms, of which drumlins and eskers are among the most distinctive. Drumlins are streamlined hills ideally having the shape of a teardrop or inverted spoon. They occ...
Chapter
This chapter discusses soil mapping and soil degradation. Compiling soil maps is an essential objective of classic soil science. Together with relief maps or digital elevation models and land-use maps, they form the basis for many questions and problems in physical geography, e.g., concerning water balance or soil erosion, and have many other pract...
Chapter
A successful small-format aerial photography (SFAP) field survey often depends on the ability to react flexibly to a plethora of complications—the more of these that can be anticipated and planned for in advance, the more likely one would return with plenty of good images. SFAP can be undertaken quickly and spontaneously, for example, with a lightw...
Chapter
This chapter discusses wetland environments. Wetlands cover substantial portions of the world's land and shore regions and represent significant components of the Earth's environment. Thus, wetlands attract considerable public interest and scientific attention, for which small-format aerial photography (SFAP) is well suited to provide low-cost imag...
Chapter
This chapter discusses vegetation and erosion. The high spatial and temporal variability of vegetation, runoff, and erosion patterns renders small-format aerial photography (SFAP) an especially suitable tool for documenting and monitoring them. Hot-air blimp and kite aerial photography (KAP) are the other methods. The protecting role of vegetation...
Chapter
Interpretation of aerial photographs begins with basic aspects—color, size, shape, pattern, texture, and shadows—combined with scene context and experience of the interpreter. Visual recognition of objects in vertical images normally requires a ground sample distance 3–5 times smaller than the object itself, although other non-spatial factors also...
Chapter
Image-processing techniques are mathematical or statistical algorithms that change the visual appearance or geometric properties of an image or transform it into another type of dataset. Many established image-processing techniques exist in the remote sensing sciences, and they may be applied to small-format aerial photography (SFAP) just as to sat...
Chapter
This chapter discusses gully erosion monitoring. Gullies are permanent erosional forms that develop in many parts of the world, particularly in arid and semi-arid environments. Gullies function as sediment sources, stores, and conveyors that link hillslopes to downstream channels. Human land use, and especially changes in land use, may accelerate g...
Chapter
This chapter discusses architecture and property management. Architecture refers to the design and construction of individual buildings, bridges, monuments, towers, and similar edifices as well as integrated building complexes. Architecture is considered one of the fine arts, and architectural photography is essential for demonstrating buildings, s...
Chapter
Camera mounts serve for attaching one or more cameras or other sensors to a platform and operating them. The most basic function is triggering the camera, usually with remotecontrolled microservos or electronic shutter release cables, and additional functions may include pan and tilt orientation, remote image capture, and control of ancillary devic...
Chapter
Aerial photography has provided the means to see the Earth ‘‘as the birds do.’’ During its first half-century of development, aerial photography was little used because of high cost and risk. With the introduction of powered flight, aerial photography expanded tremendously throughout the 1900s based on many technological inventions for various imag...
Chapter
Small-format aerial photography is based primarily on solar radiation reflected from the Earth's surface in the visible and near-infrared portions of the spectrum. SFAP is a compromise between ideal photographic conditions and the reality of what is possible to accomplish under natural conditions within logistical constraints and financial limitati...
Chapter
This chapter discusses biocontrol of salt cedar. Salt cedar is a shrub or small tree that is native to Asia, the southern Mediterranean, and northern Africa. It comprises several species within the genus Tamarix, commonly called tamarisks. Salt cedar (Tamarix sp.) is an invasive plant in the western United States and northern Mexico that is causing...
Chapter
Small-format aerial photography is done in the visible and near-infrared portions of the spectrum. Many types of spectral combinations may be photographed, ranging from conventional panchromatic to colorinfrared. All objects display spectral signatures, which are the bases for recognizing their compositions. Vegetation is particularly instructive....
Chapter
Aerial photography shares many common attributes with ground-based photography. However, the bird's-eye view afforded by small-format aerial photography opens new vistas for image composition. Most important is a consideration of top lighting for illuminating the ground scene as viewed from above. For high-oblique views, generally the horizon shoul...
Chapter
This chapter discusses golf course management. Golf course management is a sizable and rapidly growing industry worldwide. Golf courses represent a type of landscape architecture in which the topography, soils, drainage, and vegetation are altered greatly from natural conditions. In many situations, the maintenance of turf requires substantial use...
Chapter
A plethora of cameras is available for small-format aerial photography (SFAP), based on film and electronic recording techniques. In general, these cameras are relatively compact, lightweight, and capable of operating in largely automated modes. In fact, any camera designed primarily for hand-held use on the ground may be adapted for manned or unma...
Article
Full-text available
Land-use changes are the cause of severe impacts on the earth's surface characteristics. Intensification commonly leads to a reduction of plant cover and to the destruction of soil's organic matter, whereas the extensification is understood to reduce disturbance on the soil's surface. The economic situation in agriculture is leading on one hand to...