Dr. Ripudaman Singh and Dr. Dheera Kalota study the distribution of heat across Ludhiana City, Punjab, India. Ludhiana City is the largest metropolitan area in Punjab with over 1.5 million people.

Examine the heat map of Ludhiana City produced by Drs. Singh and Kalota. The irregular black boundary shows the edges of Ludhiana City with major roads shown with red lines. Outside the city limits is less developed land. Temperatures across the area is depicted from blue to red with deeper red indicating hotter temperatures and deeper blue indicating cooler temperatures.

Select the option that correctly describes this figure.

From: Singh, R., Kalota, D. J Indian Soc Remote Sens 47, 1567–1576 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12524-019-00994-8

Question

Dr. Ripudaman Singh and Dr. Dheera Kalota study the distribution of heat across Ludhiana City, Punjab, India. Ludhiana City is the largest metropolitan area in Punjab with over 1.5 million people.

Examine the heat map of Ludhiana City produced by Drs. Singh and Kalota. The irregular black boundary shows the edges of Ludhiana City with major roads shown with red lines. Outside the city limits is less developed land. Temperatures across the area is depicted from blue to red with deeper red indicating hotter temperatures and deeper blue indicating cooler temperatures.

Select the option that correctly describes this figure.

From: Singh, R., Kalota, D.  J Indian Soc Remote Sens 47, 1567–1576 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12524-019-00994-8

BlackTom AI · Accepted Answer

First, consider what the heat map is showing: color scale from blue (cooler) to red (hotter) across the Ludhiana City area, with the irregular black boundary marking city edges and red lines for major roads. The key feature to identify is whether the city core is notably warmer than its surroundings.
Option A: This map indicates that Ludhiana City does not experience an urban heat island. This is unlikely given the typical urban heat island pattern where developed urban cores, with dense buildings and impervious surfaces, trap heat and appear redder than surrounding rural areas. If the map showed uniform warmth or no urban core warming, one might consider this, but the color gradient described (deeper red indicating hotter temperatures) suggests spatial contrast between city and outskirts, not a uniform non-urban pattern.
Option B: This map indicates that heat is evenly distributed geographically. The description of a blue-to-red scale across the area, with deeper reds in some locations and blues elsewhere, implies spatial variation rather than even distribution. An even distribution would require similar colors across the entire map, which contradicts the notion of hotter temperatures concentrated in certain zones.
Option C: This map indicates that Ludhiana City experiences an urban heat island effect. The expected hallmark of an urban heat island is a noticeably hotter urban core compared to surrounding non-urban or less-developed land, often visible as warmer colors (reds) within the city boundary relative to outskirts (blues). Given the map’s design and common interpretation in urban remote sensing studies, this option correctly describes the observed pattern where the city area shows higher temperatures.
In summary, the most plausible interpretation consistent with urban heat island theory is that the city experiences an urban heat island effect, whereas the other two statements mischaracterize the spatial temperature pattern depicted on the heat map.

BIOLOGY 1114.01 SP2025 (17927) Weekly Review 12 (End global warming)

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