Abstract
Lower atmospheric ozone, a gaseous air pollutant, is toxic to many plants and threatens the health of forests across the United States. In the 1990s, the USDA Forest Service began a monitoring program to assess status and trends with respect to the presence of phytotoxic concentrations of ozone in our nation’s forests. Ozone detection is based on the foliar (leaf) injury response of ozone-sensitive bioindicator species; a response that is conditioned primarily by the levels of ozone in the air and moisture in the soil. One goal of the program is to use the injury data in conjunction with ozone exposure and plant/soil moisture indices to develop a quantitative assessment of the effects of ozone pollution on plant life across the country. Preliminary work found that a logistic regression model was inadequate to describe the relationship between ozone injury and the environmental factors. Hoping for a better fit, we applied a generalized additive model. We refined the model by using different categorization methods for foliar injury and by incorporating different geographic and ecological factors. Finally, we concluded that our refined model, when compared to the logistic model, explains the data better and provides a better description of the relationship of interest.
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Wang, P., Baines, A., Lavine, M. et al. Modelling ozone injury to U.S. forests. Environ Ecol Stat 19, 461–472 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10651-012-0195-2
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10651-012-0195-2