Evaluation of vegetation resilience in mining areas and impact of mining disturbance based on improved critical slowing down model and long time series leaf area index 后印本

摘要: Mining activities often lead to drastic alterations in surface structure, and the subsequent vegetation recovery process exhibits significant spatiotemporal heterogeneity. The Changping mining area in Shanxi Province, China was selected as the study region. Leaf area index (LAI) data derived from Sentinel-2A/B multispectral imagery were subjected to time series decomposition. Based on the decomposed series, we applied an improved critical slowing down (CSD) model to calculate two indicators— the first-order autoregressive (AR(1)) coefficient and the detrended fluctuation analysis (DFA) scaling exponent—to assess vegetation resilience. The spatiotemporal variation of vegetation resilience and its correlation with mining-induced disturbances were subsequently analyzed in the six panels in the Changping mining area from 2016 to 2024. The results indicated the following: (1) Overall, LAI in the Changping mining area exhibited a spatial pattern of higher values in the west and lower values in the east. Within naturally vegetated areas, the annual mean LAI increased from 0.891 to 1.172, showing a gradual upward trend over time; (2) Overall vegetation resilience in the Changping mining area exhibited a declining trend. Compared with 2016–2020, the proportion of areas with enhanced resilience increased by 33.97% during 2021–2024, with the most pronounced changes observed in the panels 4 and 5, indicating significant impacts of mining activities. At the working faces scale, the negative effects of mining on vegetation resilience were particularly evident, as resilience during the mining period was substantially lower than that in the corresponding control areas; And (3) mining activities exerted significant disturbances on vegetation resilience in the Changping mining area, with both temporal and spatial gradients. Owing to differences in mining intensity and operational schedules among zones, the responses of vegetation resilience were spatially heterogeneous. Vegetation resilience tended to increase with distance from the actively mined areas, and this spatial difference diminished after mining ceased, indicating a delayed and partially reversible disturbance effect. These findings provide a theoretical basis and a decision-making reference for the protection and restoration of vegetation ecosystems in mining areas.