Tree species classification of LiDAR data based on 3D deep learning

•A tree species classification method based on three-dimensional deep learning is proposed.•The network we named LayerNet can directly extract high-dimensional features from point sets.•The network relies on the global features of the tree that incorporate layered local information. Accurate tree species identification is essential for ecological evaluation and other forest applications. In this paper, we proposed a point-based deep neural network called LayerNet. For light detection and ranging (LiDAR) data in forest regions, the network can divide multiple overlapping layers in Euclidean space to obtain the local three-dimensional (3D) structural features of the tree. The features of all layers are aggregated, and the global feature is obtained by convolution to classify the tree species. To validate the proposed framework, multiple experiments, including airborne and ground-based LiDAR datasets, are conducted and compared with several existing tree species classification algorithms. The test results show that LayerNet can directly use 3D data to accurately classify tree species, with the highest classification accuracy of 92.5%. Also, the results of comparative experiments demonstrate that the proposed framework has obvious advantages in classification accuracy and provides an effective solution for tree species classification tasks.