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Quantifying the Human Influence on Fire Ignition Across the Western USA

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dc.contributor.authorFusco, Emily J.
dc.contributor.authorAbatzoglou, John T.
dc.contributor.authorBalch, Jennifer K.
dc.contributor.authorFinn, John T.
dc.contributor.authorBradley, Bethany
dc.contributor.departmentUniversity of Massachusetts Amherst
dc.contributor.departmentUniversity of Idaho
dc.contributor.departmentUniversity of Colorado, Boulder
dc.contributor.departmentUniversity of Massachusetts Amherst
dc.contributor.departmentUniversity of Massachusetts Amherst
dc.date2023-09-23T16:20:56.000
dc.date.accessioned2024-04-26T19:32:38Z
dc.date.available2024-04-26T19:32:38Z
dc.date.issued2016-01-01
dc.description<p>Copyright by the Ecological Society of America, Fusco, E. J., Abatzoglou, J. T., Balch, J. K., Finn, J. T. and Bradley, B. A. (2016), Quantifying the human influence on fire ignition across the western USA. Ecol Appl. doi: <a href="http://doi.org/10.1002/eap.1395">10.1002/eap.1395</a></p>
dc.description.abstractHumans have a profound effect on fire regimes by increasing the frequency of ignitions. Although ignition is an integral component of understanding and predicting fire, to date fire models have not been able to isolate the ignition location, leading to inconsistent use of anthropogenic ignition proxies. Here, we identified fire ignitions from the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectrometer (MODIS) Burned Area Product (2000–2012) to create the first remotely sensed, consistently derived, and regionally comprehensive fire ignition data set for the western United States. We quantified the spatial relationships between several anthropogenic land-use/disturbance features and ignition for ecoregions within the study area and used hierarchical partitioning to test how the anthropogenic predictors of fire ignition vary among ecoregions. The degree to which anthropogenic features predicted ignition varied considerably by ecoregion, with the strongest relationships found in the Marine West Coast Forest and North American Desert ecoregions. Similarly, the contribution of individual anthropogenic predictors varied greatly among ecoregions. Railroad corridors and agricultural presence tended to be the most important predictors of anthropogenic ignition, while population density and roads were generally poor predictors. Although human population has often been used as a proxy for ignitions at global scales, it is less important at regional scales when more specific land uses (e.g., agriculture) can be identified. The variability of ignition predictors among ecoregions suggests that human activities have heterogeneous impacts in altering fire regimes within different vegetation types and geographies.
dc.description.pages2390-2401
dc.identifier.doihttps://doi.org/10.1002/eap.1395
dc.identifier.urihttps://hdl.handle.net/20.500.14394/37641
dc.relation.ispartofEcological Applications
dc.relation.urlhttps://scholarworks.umass.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1382&amp;context=nrc_faculty_pubs&amp;unstamped=1
dc.source.issue8
dc.source.issue26
dc.source.statuspublished
dc.subjectAnthropogenic
dc.subjectFire
dc.subjectIgnition
dc.subjectLightning
dc.subjectMCD45A1
dc.subjectMODIS
dc.subjectRemote Sensing
dc.subjectWestern USA
dc.subjectEcology and Evolutionary Biology
dc.subjectEnvironmental Studies
dc.titleQuantifying the Human Influence on Fire Ignition Across the Western USA
dc.typearticle
dc.typearticle
digcom.contributor.authorFusco, Emily J.
digcom.contributor.authorAbatzoglou, John T.
digcom.contributor.authorBalch, Jennifer K.
digcom.contributor.authorFinn, John T.
digcom.contributor.authorisAuthorOfPublication|email:bbradley@eco.umass.edu|institution:University of Massachusetts Amherst|Bradley, Bethany
digcom.identifiernrc_faculty_pubs/383
digcom.identifier.contextkey9266417
digcom.identifier.submissionpathnrc_faculty_pubs/383
dspace.entity.typePublication
relation.isAuthorOfPublicationb7926289-9cee-4435-9cae-b476a1e9bc6a
relation.isAuthorOfPublication.latestForDiscoveryb7926289-9cee-4435-9cae-b476a1e9bc6a
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