Modeling Microfibril Angle of Larch Using Linear Mixed-Effects Models

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Earlywood microfibril angle (MFA) was determined at each growth ring from disks at breast height (1.3 m) from 6 dahurian larch (Larix gmelinii. Rupr.) trees grown in northeastern China. Significant variation in microfibril angle was observed among growth rings. MFA at breast height varied from 7.5°to 21.5°between growth rings and showed a descreasing trend from pith to bark for each tree. A second order polynomial equation with linear mixed-effects was used for modeling earlywood MFA. The LME procedure in S-Plus is used to fit the mixed-effects models for the MFA data. The results showed that the polynomial model with three random parameters could significantly improve the model performance. The fitted mixed-effects model was also evaluated using a separate dataset. The mixed model was found to predict MFA better than the original model fitted using ordinary least-squares based on absolute and relative errors.

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516-520

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June 2011

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© 2011 Trans Tech Publications Ltd. All Rights Reserved

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