{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2026,5,15]],"date-time":"2026-05-15T01:02:15Z","timestamp":1778806935444,"version":"3.51.4"},"reference-count":55,"publisher":"MDPI AG","issue":"3","license":[{"start":{"date-parts":[[2020,1,26]],"date-time":"2020-01-26T00:00:00Z","timestamp":1579996800000},"content-version":"vor","delay-in-days":0,"URL":"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/4.0\/"}],"funder":[{"DOI":"10.13039\/501100001809","name":"National Natural Science Foundation of China","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","award":["31770512"],"award-info":[{"award-number":["31770512"]}],"id":[{"id":"10.13039\/501100001809","id-type":"DOI","asserted-by":"publisher"}]},{"name":"Open Foundation of the State Key Laboratory of Urban and Regional Ecology of China","award":["SKLURE2019-2-6"],"award-info":[{"award-number":["SKLURE2019-2-6"]}]},{"name":"Shanghai Key Lab for Urban Ecological Processes and Eco-Restoration","award":["SHUES2019A01"],"award-info":[{"award-number":["SHUES2019A01"]}]}],"content-domain":{"domain":[],"crossmark-restriction":false},"short-container-title":["Remote Sensing"],"abstract":"<jats:p>Urban natural surfaces and non-surface human activities are key factors determining the urban heat island (UHI), but their relative importance remains highly controversial and may vary at different spatial scales and focal urban systems. However, systematic studies on the scale-dependency system-specificity remain largely lacking. Here, we selected 32 major Chinese cities as cases and used Landsat 8 images to retrieve land surface temperature (LST) and quantify natural surface variables using point of interest (POI) data as a measure of the human activity variable and using multiple regression and relative weight analysis to study the contribution and relative importance of these factors to LST at a range of grain sizes (0.25\u20135 km) and spatial extents (20\u201360 km). We revealed that the contributions and relative importance of natural surfaces and human activities are largely scale-dependent and system-specific. Natural surfaces, especially vegetation cover, are often the most important UHI determinants for a majority of scales, but the importance of non-surface human activities is increasingly pronounced at a coarser spatial scale with respect to both grain and spatial extent. The scaling relations of the UHI determinants and their relative importance were mostly linear-like at the city-collective level, but highly diverse across individual cities, so reducing non-surface heat emissions could be the most effective measure in particular cases, especially at relatively large spatial scales. This study advances the understanding of UHI formation mechanisms and highlights the complexity of the scale issue underpinning the UHI effect.<\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.3390\/rs12030391","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2020,1,27]],"date-time":"2020-01-27T07:41:11Z","timestamp":1580110871000},"page":"391","update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.3390\/mdpi_crossmark_policy","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":41,"title":["Remote Sensing and Social Sensing Data Reveal Scale-Dependent and System-Specific Strengths of Urban Heat Island Determinants"],"prefix":"10.3390","volume":"12","author":[{"given":"Xiali","family":"Luan","sequence":"first","affiliation":[{"name":"School of Life Sciences, Nanjing University, Nanjing 210023, China"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0003-4576-4541","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Zhaowu","family":"Yu","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Geosciences and Natural Resource Management, Faculty of Science, University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen 1958, Denmark"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"given":"Yuting","family":"Zhang","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"School of Life Sciences, Nanjing University, Nanjing 210023, China"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"given":"Sheng","family":"Wei","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"School of Architecture and Urban Planning, Nanjing University, Nanjing 210093, China"},{"name":"Jiangsu Institute of Urban Planning and Design, Nanjing 210036, China"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"given":"Xinyu","family":"Miao","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"School of Life Sciences, Nanjing University, Nanjing 210023, China"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0002-8761-3787","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Zheng Y. X.","family":"Huang","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"College of Life Sciences, Nanjing Normal University, Nanjing 210023, China"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"given":"Shuqing N.","family":"Teng","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"School of Life Sciences, Nanjing University, Nanjing 210023, China"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]},{"given":"Chi","family":"Xu","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"School of Life Sciences, Nanjing University, Nanjing 210023, China"}],"role":[{"role":"author","vocabulary":"crossref"}]}],"member":"1968","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2020,1,26]]},"reference":[{"key":"ref_1","unstructured":"United Nations (2019). World Urbanization Prospects: The 2018 Revision (st\/esa\/ser.A\/420), United Nations, Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Population Division."},{"key":"ref_2","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Oke, T.R. (2002). 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