Low-altitude unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) remote sensing system overcomes the deficiencies of space and aerial remote sensing system in resolution, revisit period, cloud cover and cost, which provides a novel method for ecological research on mesoscale. This study introduced the composition of UAV remote sensing system, reviewed its applications in species, population, community and ecosystem ecology research. Challenges and opportunities of UAV ecology were identified to direct future research. The promising research area of UAV ecology includes the establishment of species morphology and spectral characteristic data base, species automatic identification, the revelation of relationship between spectral index and plant physiological processes, three-dimension monitoring of ecosystem, and the integration of remote sensing data from multi resources and multi scales. With the development of UAV platform, data transformation and sensors, UAV remote sensing technology will have wide application in ecology research.
无人机低空遥感系统弥补了航天和航空遥感在影像分辨率、重访周期、云层影响以及高成本等方面的不足,为中观尺度的生态学研究提供了新方法.本文介绍了轻小型无人机低空遥感系统的组成,从物种、种群、群落和生态系统尺度综述了其在生态学中的应用现状,并指出目前存在的不足和未来的发展方向,以期为无人机生态学的后续研究提供参考.无人机生态学当前面临的挑战和未来发展的方向主要有物种形态和光谱特征库的建立、物种自动识别、光谱数据与植物生理生态过程之间关系的进一步挖掘、生态系统三维立体监测、多来源多尺度遥感数据融合等.随着无人机平台技术、传感器技术以及数据传输处理技术的成熟,以无人机低空遥感技术为基础的无人机生态学将迎来发展的机遇和曙光.
Keywords: LiDAR; hyperspectral imager; low-altitude remote sensing; multispectral imager; thermal infrared imager; unmanned aerial vehicles ecology.