FORMIND is an individual based, forest gap model that is used to simulate the growth of forests.
Forest Succession
Individual-based means that growth is calculated for each tree individually. In high diversity forests, species are classified into different plant functional types in order to facilitate the parameter estimation and to reduce computing time.
FORMIND Patch Structure
Analized forest area (1 to 50 ha) is divided into 20m x 20m patches. Large trees can fall down and create gaps in the forest leading to the simulation of forest structure and dynamics. Gaps can occur also due to disturbances like fire, landslides, logging or drought. Once a gap has formed, light-demanding species can establish.
FORMIND allows to simulate forests and is based on the forest gap model FORMIX3.
Current research topics are:
Detailed analysis of the effects of logging and fragmentation in tropical, temperate and boreal regions.
All copyrights of a material (model, data, article, etc.) in the OpenGMS fully belong to its author/developer/designer (or any other wording about the owner). The OpenGMS takes every care to avoid copyright infringement, contributor(s) should carefully employ materials from other sources and give proper citations.