TerraBrasilis: A Spatial Data Analytics Infrastructure for Large-Scale Thematic Mapping

Abstract

The physical phenomena derived from an analysis of remotely sensed imagery provide a clearer understanding of the spectral variations of a large number of land use and cover (LUC) classes. The creation of LUC maps have corroborated this view by enabling the scientific community to estimate the parameter heterogeneity of the Earth’s surface. Along with descriptions of features and statistics for aggregating spatio-temporal information, the government programs have disseminated thematic maps to further the implementation of effective public policies and foster sustainable development. In Brazil, PRODES and DETER have shown that they are committed to monitoring the mapping areas of large-scale deforestation systematically and by means of data quality assurance. However, these programs are so complex that they require the designing, implementation and deployment of a spatial data infrastructure based on extensive data analytics features so that users who lack a necessary understanding of standard spatial interfaces can still carry out research on them. With this in mind, the Brazilian National Institute for Space Research (INPE) has designed TerraBrasilis, a spatial data analytics infrastructure that provides interfaces that are not only found within traditional geographic information systems but also in data analytics environments with complex algorithms. To ensure it achieved its best performance, we leveraged a micro-service architecture with virtualized computer resources to enable high availability, lower size, simplicity to produce an increment, reliable to change and fault tolerance in unstable computer network scenarios. In addition, we tuned and optimized our databases both to adjust to the input format of complex algorithms and speed up the loading of the web application so that it was faster than other systems.

Hidden biodiversity of Amazonian white-sand ecosystems: two distinctive new species of Utricularia (Lentibulariaceae) from Pará, Brazil

“…The distribution map was generated with the software QGIS (QGIS Development Team 2020) using layers available from IBGE (2020). The TerraBrasilis platform (Assis et al 2019), which uses the Sistema de Detecção do Desmatamento em Tempo Real (DETER) of the Instituto Nacional de Pesquisas Espaciais (INPE), was used to acquire recent data on deforestation and fire records in the area. Coordinates were obtained in the field using GPS tracking.…”

“…In fact, large areas were recently impacted by fires less than 1 km away from the subpopulations ( Fig. 1; data from Assis et al 2019). In addition, the site is sought by tourists from nearby municipalities because of the Jaramacaru waterfall, therefore leading to negative anthropogenic impact on the populations.…”

Assessment of Spatial and Temporal Distribution of Clouds in Northeast Brazil (2000 -2019) using MODIS Data

“…In addition, the 2017/2018 period reveals that between the five states those still maintaining unacceptable rates of deforestation, two encompasses in NEB: Piauí (2,100 ha of deforestation) and Bahia (1,985 ha) States. Non-less aggravating, in Cerrado biome the DETER system (corresponding to may/2020 observation), pointed that the five most deforested municipalities are in NEB: Balsas/Maranhão (174 Km²), Formosa do Rio Preto/Bahia (166 Km²), Luis Eduardo Magalhães/Bahia (74 km²), Jaborandi/Bahia (71 km²), and São Desidério/Bahia (69 km²) (ASSIS et al, 2019;INPE, 2020). In these operational systems, two satellite datasets are considered to map the Atlantic Forest and Cerrado biomes as cited in section 1.…”

Evaluation of Deep Learning Techniques for Deforestation Detection in the Brazilian Amazon and Cerrado Biomes From Remote Sensing Imagery

“…Following the Amazon biome, Cerrado is the Brazilian biome that undergone significant changes due to human occupation [15]. Despite its biological importance, it faces intense land-use pressure, losing over 50% of natural vegetation due to agricultural expansion [16][17][18]. Moreover, the Cerrado has been one of the least studied biomes in Brazil.…”

“…The deforested areas are estimated by photointerpretation of images acquired at different dates. This process is carried out by specialists who delineate polygons of deforestation directly on the computer screen [16], which makes the whole task highly dependent on human intervention. The project currently uses LANDSAT 8/OLI, SENTINEL 2 and CBERS 4 images [34] and it considers a minimum mapping area of 6.25 ha, regardless of the used instrument.…”