Emerging technologies for biodiversity assessment of changing tropical forests

Summary

This thesis investigates the application of emerging satellite remote sensing and in-situ measurements to assess the complex forest biodiversity dynamics in changing tropical forests. Thus, the main objective of this thesis is to explore the potential of using emerging remote sensing technologies to assess differences in forest structure of habitats and to integrate such information with actual biodiversity data to further increase the detail and accuracy of biodiversity assessments. A particular focus is given to the use of terrestrial LiDAR and satellite remote sensing for deriving forest structure parameters that inform on the state of different tropical forest habitats. For this purpose, field plots were established in the UNESCO Kafa biosphere reserve (KBR), Ethiopia. The use of satellite remote sensing, terrestrial LiDAR, and DNA metabarcoding methods were explored to track forest habitat differences and the associated biodiversity dynamics.