Evaluation of the consistency of the three MRPV model parameters provided by the MISR level 2 land surface products: a case study in Mainland Spain

ABSTRACT

The multiangular Rahman–Pinty–Verstraete modified (MRPV) semi-empirical model uses three parameters (ρ₀, Θ, and k) for describing the anisotropy of an arbitrary target. They have been usefully proved to characterize some forest attributes and land covers. However, there is no enough evaluation of the consistency of this product, and the possible affection from different factors in the reliability of them. Here, we explored the consistency of the MRPV parameters provided in the MISR L2 Land Surface (MIL2ASLS) product, with data from Mainland Spain, grouping MISR images into close time pairs. Thus, it was studied the three MRPV parameters through retrieving Spearman’s rank correlation coefficient (ρ) and mean relative differences related to every pair of images. The results showed the ρ₀ parameter presented higher consistency than the others, with ρ over 0.85 and meant relative differences around 15%. The k parameter showed ρ over 0.65 and average relative disagreements over 8%. Finally, the Θ parameter reached ρ around 0.60. The Θ mean differences were over 25% unless the combination of the blue band which was especially bad and its values were up to 50%. So, it is crucial having into account when the parameters of this product are used to look into the band and the own parameter.

KEYWORDS:

• MRPV
• BRF
• multiangular data
• MIL2ASLS
• MISR
• consistency

Acknowledgements

The MISR data were obtained from the NASA Langley Atmospheric Science Data Center.

The authors would like to thank Liam L. Laffey for the manuscript grammatical and spelling revision and also A. García Bruzón for its contributions to the edition process.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.