West Europe from space stock photo

Our People

Professor Mathias (Mat) Disney

Divisional Director Carbon Cycle
Carbon cycle: land, atmosphere and oceans

Research interests

I am interested in vegetation – particularly trees, forests and the carbon cycle. I use EO data such as ground-based and other lidar, to make measurements of forests and carbon as well as to understand radiative transfer in these systems.

Recent publications

Bitemporal Radiative Transfer Modeling Using Bitemporal 3D-Explicit Forest Reconstruction from Terrestrial Laser Scanning. 2024-09-29

Detecting selective logging in tropical forests with optical satellite data: an experiment in Peru shows texture at 3 m gives the best results. 2024-07-30

Multi-scale lidar measurements suggest miombo woodlands contain substantially more carbon than thought. 2024-07-10

Tree Surface Area Allometry. 2024-04-28

Limitations of estimating branch volume from terrestrial laser scanning. 2024-04

The impact of forest canopy structure on modelled photosynthesis. 2024-03-08

Giant sequoia ( Sequoiadendron giganteum ) in the UK: carbon storage potential and growth rates. 2024-03

TLS2trees: A scalable tree segmentation pipeline for TLS data. 2023-12

Toward a forest biomass reference measurement system for remote sensing applications. 2023-02

Analysing individual 3D tree structure using the R package ITSMe. 2023-01

TLS2trees: a scalable tree segmentation pipeline for TLS data. 2022-12-11

Laser scanning reveals potential underestimation of biomass carbon in temperate forest. 2022-10

Sentinel-1 Shadows Used to Quantify Canopy Loss from Selective Logging in Gabon. 2022-08-27

Estimating forest above‐ground biomass with terrestrial laser scanning: Current status and future directions. 2022-08

Implications of 3D Forest Stand Reconstruction Methods for Radiative Transfer Modeling: A Case Study in the Temperate Deciduous Forest. 2022-07-27

Gaining insight into the allometric scaling of trees by utilizing 3d reconstructed tree models – a SimpleForest study. 2022-05-05

Detecting Tropical Forest Degradation Using Optical Satellite Data: An Experiment in Peru Show Texture at 3 M Gives Best Results. 2022-02-09

An Effective Method for InSAR Mapping of Tropical Forest Degradation in Hilly Areas. 2022-01-18

Terrestrial laser scanning to reconstruct branch architecture from harvested branches. 2021-12

To What Extent Can UAV Photogrammetry Replicate UAV LiDAR to Determine Forest Structure? A Test in Two Contrasting Tropical Forests. 2021-12

An Effective Method for InSAR Mapping of Tropical Forest Degradation in Hilly Areas. 2021-11-09

SimpleForest – a comprehensive tool for 3d reconstruction of trees from forest plot point clouds. 2021-07-30

New insights into large tropical tree mass and structure from direct harvest and terrestrial lidar. 2021-02

Quantifying urban forest structure with open-access remote sensing data sets. 2020-04

Transpiration from subarctic deciduous woodlands: Environmental controls and contribution to ecosystem evapotranspiration. 2020-04

3D forest model-assisted validation of the Sentinel-2 SNAP fAPAR product. 2020-03-23

Time for a Plant Structural Economics Spectrum. 2020-03-23

Theoretical uncertainties for global satellite-derived burned area estimates. 2019-08-23

Innovations in Ground and Airborne Technologies as Reference and for Training and Validation: Terrestrial Laser Scanning (TLS). 2019-07-29

Terrestrial LiDAR: a three‐dimensional revolution in how we look at trees. 2019-06

Leaf and wood classification framework for terrestrial LiDAR point clouds. 2019-05

Theoretical uncertainties for global satellite-derived burned area estimates. 2019-04-03

Extracting individual trees from lidar point clouds using treeseg. 2019-03

Performance of Laser-Based Electronic Devices for Structural Analysis of Amazonian Terra-Firme Forests. 2019-03

Finite element analysis of trees in the wind based on terrestrial laser scanning data. 2019-02

New estimates of leaf angle distribution from terrestrial LiDAR: Comparison with measured and modelled estimates from nine broadleaf tree species. 2019-01

Decoupling Canopy Structure and Leaf Biochemistry: Testing the Utility of Directional Area Scattering Factor (DASF). 2018-11-29

Detecting Human Presence and Influence on Neotropical Forests with Remote Sensing. 2018-10-05

Realistic Forest Stand Reconstruction from Terrestrial LiDAR for Radiative Transfer Modelling. 2018-06

New perspectives on the ecology of tree structure and tree communities through terrestrial laser scanning. 2018-04-06

Non-intersecting leaf insertion algorithm for tree structure models. 2018-04-06

The terrestrial laser scanning revolution in forest ecology. 2018-04-06

Weighing trees with lasers: advances, challenges and opportunities. 2018-04-06

Estimation of above‐ground biomass of large tropical trees with terrestrial LiDAR. 2018-02

A New Global fAPAR and LAI Dataset Derived from Optimal Albedo Estimates: Comparison with MODIS Products. 2016-03