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We are pleased to announce that Professor Jean Poesen (Department of Geology, Soil Science and Geoinformation, UMCS) is a co-author of a new publication in the prestigious journal Scientific Data (Springer Nature, IF’23: 5.8, Open Access):
Borrelli P., Matthews F., Alewell C., Kaffas K., Poesen J., Saggau P., Prăvălie R., Vanmaercke M., Panagos P., 2025. A hybrid in situ and on-screen survey to monitor gully erosion across the European Union. Scientific Data, 12, 755.https://doi.org/10.1038/s41597-025-05074-w
The article presents the first pan-European inventory of gully erosion, based on nearly 400,000 monitoring sites recorded during the 2022 LUCAS survey (EUROSTAT). A hybrid approach was applied, combining field observations and satellite image analysis. The results enabled the development of a new model, GE-LUCAS v1.1, which estimates the probability of gully formation across the entire European Union.
Most erosion features were recorded in Mediterranean regions—particularly in Spain and Italy. A strong correlation was found between the presence of gullies and land use type, vegetation cover, topography, soil texture, and rainfall intensity. The presence of olive groves on sloped, sparsely vegetated terrain proved especially significant.
This publication makes a major contribution to advancing soil degradation monitoring methods and supports the implementation of the EU Soil Strategy and future actions within the Common Agricultural Policy. The authors advocate for the establishment of a new gully monitoring system based on spatial modelling and high-resolution satellite data.
Publication list of Institute staff
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