bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Uncertainties Analysis of the Hydrological Modelling in Himalayan Region: A Case Study of Alaknanda River Basin
Authors: Gupta Sagar , Mangukiya Nikunj K. , Sharma Ashutosh , Sen Sumit , Agrawal Ankit , Santis Domenico De , Massari Christian , Barbetta Silvia
Published: March 2024

Understanding natural processes, particularly the water cycle, is inherently challenging due to their unpredictable and complex nature. This complexity is especially pronounced when employing hydrological models, where simplifications introduce various uncertainties. Failing to acknowledge and address these uncertainties can introduce biases into the model outcomes, potentially influencing subsequent decision-making processes. This issue is particularly pertinent in the Indian Himalayan Regions, where significant contributions come from melting of snow and glaciers.  The uncertainties in both model inputs and structures are exacerbated in this region, which is further compounded by the scarcity of reliable data. Consequently, there is a critical need to systematically quantify the diverse sources of uncertainty to ensure accurate and reliable hydrological predictions. This study focuses on the snow-dominant Alaknanda basin within the Indian Himalayan Region (IHR), encompassing three gauging stations. The SWAT+ hydrological model and Modular Assessment of Rainfall-Runoff Models Toolbox (MARRMoT) framework (Trotter et al., 2022) are employed to assess parameter and model structure uncertainties, respectively. The SWAT+ model, calibrated with the Latin Hypercube Sampling (LHS) algorithm, achieved Nash-Sutcliffe Efficiency (NSE) values of 0.56, 0.79, and 0.61. Parameter uncertainty is further examined using diverse parameter sets generated through the LHS algorithm. Furthermore, with the application of 47 lumped conceptual models within MARRMoT framework, assessment of model structure uncertainty underscores the varying importance of processes, particularly snow storage, soil moisture, and routing storage in the study region. The findings reveal that the inclusion of additional storage components in the model leads to a decline in performance, accompanied by an increase in complexity and uncertainties. Notably, the study concludes that, for the investigated region, the contribution of parameter uncertainty surpasses that of model structure uncertainty. These insights emphasize the need for a nuanced understanding of both parameter and structural uncertainties to enhance the reliability of hydrological predictions in data-scarce and complex regions like the IHR.References:Trotter, L., Knoben, W. J. M., Fowler, K. J. A., Saft, M., & Peel, M. C. (2022). Modular Assessment of Rainfall–Runoff Models Toolbox (MARRMoT) v2. 1: an object-oriented implementation of 47 established hydrological models for improved speed and readability. Geoscientific Model Development, 15(16), 6359–6369. 
Improving the active AirCore system to determine the destruction rate efficiency of gas flares in the Netherlands
Authors: van Ettinger Noni , van Heuven Steven , Chen Huilin
Published: March 2024

Avoiding unnecessary methane (CH4) emissions is an easy way to mitigate the effects ofclimate change, since methane has a higher global warming potential and a shorter lifetimecompared to carbon dioxide (CO2) and often no purpose is served with the flaring. Flaring isthe disposal of associated gas by combustion. In some cases, the flaring is unavoidable toensure the safety of the personnel, while in other instances flaring can easily be avoided,resulting in unnecessary emissions. Yearly, approximately 140 billion cubic meters is flaredglobally. With a destruction rate efficiency (DRE) of 98%, this results in yearly GHGs emissionof 315 Mt of CO2 and 1.4 Mt of CH4 (or 315 Mt and 42 Mt of CO2 equivalent). It is speculatedthat the DRE of flares in operation is generally lower. For example, Plant et al. 2022 found aDRE of 91% across three oil basins in the United States using an aircraft-based study.However, there is still a lack of experimental data from other countries and on facility-scale.In this research, the active AirCore system described by Andersen et al. 2018 was improvedand used to determine the flaring efficiency from gas flares in the Netherlands. An in-situCO2 sensor was added to obtain an in-flight signal allowing to reliably sample the entirecross section of the plume. To test the system, it was used during two separate campaignsin the Netherlands. The flaring (by a Dutch national gas grid operator) is a routine part ofscheduled infrastructure maintenance. The operator’s mobile flaring unit has beenspecifically designed for high-efficiency combustion. In the flare plume, we observed a DREof 99.7% ± 0.2%. However, the last 1.2 bar absolute (of 40) that remains in the gas pipes isvented and decreases the methane emission mitigation efficacy (MEME) of the operator’sprocedure with 3%. Additionally, using the in-situ sensor we were able to determine the CO2fluxes from flaring during the campaigns which equated to a CH4 burn rate of 1240 ± 300m3/h over three different flights, which agrees with the nominal burn rate of 1200 m3/h. Thisshows that the system can characterize flaring efficiency and emissions well, which providesus the capability to use the system in future flaring campaigns where the gas flushing rate isstill unknown.ReferencesAndersen, T., Scheeren, B., Peters, W., Chen, H. (2018). A UAV-based active Aircore system formeasurements of greenhouse gases. Atmos. Meas. Tech., 11, 2683-2699,https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-11-2683-2018Plant, G., Kort, E. A., Brandt, A. R., Chen, Y., Fordice, G., Gorchov Negron, A. M., Schwietzke, S.,Smith, M., & Zavala-Araiza, D. (2022). Inefficient and unlit natural gas flares both emit largequantities of methane. Science, 377(6614), 1566–1571. https://doi.org/10.1126/science.abq0385
Soil microbial communities in Danish lowlands are shaped by soil pH 
Authors: Danielsen Anne-Cathrine , Pesch Charles , Hermansen Cecilie , Singleton Caitlin Margaret , Bygh Nymann Jensen Thomas , Yang Yu , Halkjær Nielsen Per , Humlekrog Greve Mogens , Lystbæk Weber Peter , Arthur Emmanuel , Gutierrez Sebastian , Møldrup Per , Normand Signe , Wollesen de Jonge Lis
Published: March 2024

Agricultural activity on drained lowlands is a common practice in Denmark and there are suggestions to rewet some of them for climate mitigation purposes. Rewetting those lowlands might result in a change in microbial community composition. This study investigates the current prokaryotic diversity and community composition in soil samples from cultivated lowlands to provide the baseline for monitoring changes after rewetting. Furthermore, variations in soil properties between sites are examined, and the properties driving differences in prokaryotic diversity and community composition are identified. In total, 116 samples were collected from field sites across Denmark that were categorized as one of four different land-use types: Crop, Grass, Fallow, and Other. Soil properties were selected to cover chemical (soil water repellency, pH, electrical conductivity), hydrological (depth to ground-water table, soil water content at field capacity (-100 hPa)), nutrient-related (total nitrogen, organic carbon, carbon-to-nitrogen-ratio, fractions of pyrolizable and residual organic matter), and structural (total porosity, pore size distribution index) functions of the soil. Soil samples exhibited significant variations in their chemical and physical properties, including pH ranging from 2.02 to 7.55, organic carbon ranging from 3 g 100g-1 to 50 g 100g-1, soil water repellency ranging from 71.27 mN m-1 (hydrophilic) to 33.85 mN m-1 (very strongly hydrophobic), and total porosity ranging from 51% to 95%. Soil samples clustered according to soil class (mineral, organo-mineral, organic, highly organic) but not according to land-use type (crop, grass, fallow, other). Prokaryotic alpha diversity, measured as Shannon’s diversity index (H), ranged from 4.16 to 5.89 across samples and could best be predicted by pH, followed by total porosity, fraction of pyrolizable carbon, and pore size distribution index. The pH alone explained 36% of the variation in H between samples. Hierarchical clustering identified three prokaryotic clusters highly correlated with pH. A weak correlation was found between differences in community composition (beta diversity) and geographic distance (r = 0.15, p < 0.001). However, pH was also the main driver of beta diversity, explaining 11% of the variation. At the same time, models including additional variables only had marginally better explanatory power. In conclusion, pH was the predominant driver of prokaryotic alpha and beta diversity across land-use types in lowland soils.
Local scale of ground deformation along faults in area and vicinity of one possible Einstein Telescope location
Authors: Owczarz Karolina , Schlögel Romy , Orban Anne , Havenith Hans-Balder
Published: March 2024

The Einstein Telescope area was a research site of a project called Ground Deformation from Meteorological, Seismic and Anthropogenic Changes Analyzed by Remote Sensing, Geomatic Experiments and Extended Reality (GERMANE), which aimed to analyze ground deformation hazards induced by meteorological changes and seismotectonic conditions in eastern Belgium, western Germany and the south-eastern Netherlands. Within the project we proposed and applied an approach based on various Synthetic Aperture Radar Interferometry (InSAR) processing methods to detect and measure ground motions in time series. We focused on the Persistent Scatterer Interferometry (PSI), Small Baseline Subset (SBAS)  and Parallel Small BAseline Subset (P-SBAS) methods. An important issue was that the current neotectonic activity in the target area was not well known, but through spatiotemporal analysis of ground deformation we investigated behavior along NW-SE trending normal faults, where karst also develops, as well as along Variscan  NE-SW trending thrust faults. Time series analyzes were performed along Gueule fault and Gulp fault, which cross the Einstein Telescope area in the Pays de Herve (Belgium) and Heerlerheide fault in the Roer Valley Graben (Germany). We calculated the relative double difference (RDD) of Line of Sight (LOS) displacements to estimate relative deformation of one point with respect to the other. Additionally, we detected regression lines with Bayesian information criterion (BIC) that enables to choose the model which represents better the set of data points corresponding to specific InSAR techniques in double difference. In results, annual velocity rates of the benchmarks extracted along the Gueule and Gulp faults were less than -2mm/yr – which are insignificant value. However, comparing the velocity values for the extracted benchmarks along the faults, it can be seen that the Gulp fault is characterized by slightly higher annual velocities than the Gueule fault. Our time series analyses results along the Heerlerheide fault indicated that its eastern face is uplifting with velocity rates of up to 8 mm/yr. The obtained InSAR results are very small and can be described as insignificant, therefore we cannot find increased seismic activity of the analysed faults, especially the Heerlerheide and Gueule ones, as old mining activity may be responsible for the observed deformation. In sum, the faults crossing the Einstein Telescope area do not show significant displacements, which confirms the initial hypothesis of their low seismotectonic activity. Therefore, we consider the possible Einstein Telescope location as being relatively stable.
Experimental Analysis and Numerical Simulation of Wind Effect on Runoff in Urban Built Areas
Authors: Gao Xichao , Xu Tianyin , Yang Zhiyong , Gao Kai
Published: March 2024

With global warming and the development of urbanization, urban flooding has become one of the most serious nature disasters, prompting the research of the mechanism of urban rainfall-runoff process. The built-up area is an important part of the urban area. Its complex vertical structure and horizontal distribution present new challenges to hydrological modelling: wind can induce a tilt in the trajectory of rainfall movement. Tilted rainfall can be obstructed by the sidewalls of buildings, leading to runoff generation on the building sidewalls. In addition, the runoff process on the building sidewalls is influenced by the local wind field and the distribution of buildings. Existing urban hydrological models have not taken these issues into consideration. This study investigates the impact mechanisms of wind on the runoff process in urban built areas through experimental analysis and CFD numerical simulation. And a hydrological model which can consider the impact of wind on runoff processes in urban built areas is proposed and verified. The results show that: (1) the total amount of rainfall received by the built areas and the rate of rainfall received by buildings to that received by the ground increases initially and then gradually stabilizes with the increasing wind speed. (2) the total runoff of the built area initially increases and then levels off with the increasing wind speed, and the outflow hydrograph amplifies as wind speed increases. (3) the proposed hydrological model has a better performance in peak flow simulation and the values of key parameters are more physically reasonable.
Homogenization of GNSS IWV time series and estimation of climatic trends
Authors: Bock Olivier , Nguyen Ninh Khanh , Lebarbier Emilie
Published: March 2024

Water vapor plays a key role in the Earth's climate as a dominant greenhouse gas. It is also the most efficient actor of heat transfer from the surface to the atmosphere and from low to high latitudes which shapes the global atmospheric circulation and weather systems. Monitoring and understanding the spatial and temporal variability and changes of water vapor are thus of crucial importance.This work aims at computing decadal trends of total column Integrated Water Vapour (IWV) from a global network of ground-based GNSS observations. Although GNSS observations are available with high accuracy in all weather conditions, it has been shown that, over long periods of time, changes in instrumentation, in station location and environment, and in processing methods can introduce spurious shifts in the IWV time series and bias trend estimates. Homogenization is a crucial step to detect and correct such non-climatic signals.We have developed a relative homogenization method which involves three steps.Segmentation. First, change-points are detected from the difference series (GNSS – reference) with the help of the GNSSseg segmentation package (Quarello et al., 2022). The method uses a difference series in order to cancel out the common climatic variations. It also accounts for changes in the variance on fixed intervals (monthly) and a periodic bias (annual) due to representativeness differences between GNSS and the reference (in our case the ERA5 reanalysis). Because the change-points detected in the difference series could be either due to GNSS or to the reference (ERA5), the next step is the attribution.
Attribution. Second, the detected change-points are attributed to either GNSS or to the reference (ERA5) using a statistical test based on linear regression and a predictive rule based on the Random Forest learning algorithm (Nguyen et al., 2023). This step requires additional neighbors stations (at least one).
Correction. The last step is the correction. Here the initial GNSS series is corrected only for the shifts which are attributed to the GNSS in the second step.
We will present results of the homogenization procedure applied to a global network of GNSS stations and discuss the impact of homogenization on linear trend estimates for stations that have more than 20 years of observations.Quarello et al., 2022, https://doi.org/10.3390/rs14143379Nguyen et al., 2023, https://hal-obspm.ccsd.cnrs.fr/IGN-ENSG/hal-04014145v
Balancing Urban Heat, Flood and Water Scarcity: Blue-Green Infrastructure in Alpine Cities 
Authors: Ambrosi Lisa , Kleidorfer Manfred , Einfalt Thomas , Back Yannick , Jasper-Tönnies Alrun , Fennig Claudia , Hauser Martina , Funke Fabian , Leitinger Georg
Published: March 2024

In Alpine cities, water management needs to be adapted to the challenges of climate change, including altering temperature and precipitation patterns. Blue-green infrastructure (i.e., the combination of nature-based and technical solutions) can help to improve the water and energy balance, to increase the evaporative cooling effect, to maintain sufficient soil water availability and to reduce runoff peaks. Thus, it can reduce the risks of heat, drought and flooding, and improve the overall quality of life in cities. The implementation of blue-green infrastructure requires an interdisciplinary approach, as mechanisms of urban water management and ecohydrology (i.e., energy balance and soil-plant-atmosphere continuum) must be optimized with regard to the common goal.In the research project 'BlueGreenCities', ecological and technical disciplines are integrated to close knowledge gaps regarding (1) land-atmosphere interactions in ecological, hydrological and meteorological systems, and (2) the performance of blue-green adaptation measures under different climate scenarios in alpine urban areas. We present first results of measurement campaigns and eco-hydrological modelling to better understand the energy budget of various green spaces in the city of Innsbruck, Austria. Moreover, we give first insights if the specialty of the alpine setting (increasing summer droughts, but still cold winter temperatures) will be a chance or a burden for the current urban vegetation in the future.The outcomes of our project underpin the importance of climate-friendly and future-proof planning of urban green spaces to ensure proper functioning of the blue-green infrastructure concept. The results support scientists as well as urban planners, land developers and policy stakeholders in decision-making for sustainable and flexible water management systems that maintain human well-being, economic development and environmental protection. This work is funded by the Austrian Climate and Energy Fund in the project BlueGreenCities (Project No. KR21KB0K00001), funding period: October 2022 until September 2025.
Numerical modelling and classification of thermo-hydro-mechanical convective regimes
Authors: Antonenko Boris , Khakimova Lyudmila , Podladchikov Yury
Published: March 2024

The simulation and visualization of geodynamical processes poses a major challenge for due to spatial and time scales spanning many orders of magnitude and highly nonlinear phenomena. Modeling and solving such processes are necessary in order to accurately predict changes in natural systems. Two-phase models of fluid flow in deformable porous media are widely used to explain the various processes that occur in the Earth’s interior and subsurface. However, thermal processes, especially volume changes caused by thermal expansion, are typically ignored.In this study, numerical simulation methods were used to describe a mathematical model of heat transfer processes in a porous media. The purpose of these studies is to determine the influence of nondimensional parameters (Rayleigh numbers) on the convection regimes (free and porous convections). To study these problems, numerical modeling of a nonlinear thermo-hydro-mechanical processes in porous materials filled with a fluid under gravity. The finite difference staggered grid discretization and a graphics processing unit based pseudo-transient solver are utilized in the numerical simulation.We perform systematic numerical simulations and dimensional analysis to classify the regimes of convection.
Estimation of Small Stream Water Surface Elevation Using UAV Photogrammetry and Deep Learning
Authors: Szostak Radosław , Zimnoch Mirosław , Wachniew Przemysław , Pietroń Marcin , Ćwiąkała Paweł
Published: March 2024

Unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) photogrammetry allows the generation of orthophoto and digital surface model (DSM) rasters of a terrain. However, DSMs of water bodies mapped using this technique often reveal distortions in the water surface, thereby impeding the accurate sampling of water surface elevation (WSE) from DSMs. This study investigates the capability of deep neural networks to accommodate the aforementioned perturbations and effectively estimate WSE from photogrammetric rasters. Convolutional neural networks (CNNs) were employed for this purpose. Three regression approaches utilizing CNNs were explored: i) direct regression employing an encoder, ii) prediction of the weight mask using an encoder-decoder architecture, subsequently used to sample values from the photogrammetric DSM, and iii) a solution based on the fusion of the two approaches. The dataset employed in this study comprises data collected from five case studies of small lowland streams in Poland and Denmark, consisting of 322 DSM and orthophoto raster samples. Each sample corresponds to a 10 by 10 meter area of the stream channel and adjacent land. A grid search was employed to identify the optimal combination of encoder, mask generation architecture, and batch size among multiple candidates. Solutions were evaluated using two cross-validation methods: stratified k-fold cross-validation, where validation subsets maintained the same proportion of samples from all case studies, and leave-one-case-out cross-validation, where the validation dataset originates entirely from a single case study, and the training set consists of samples from other case studies. The proposed solution was compared with existing methods for measuring water levels in small streams using a drone. The results indicate that the solution outperforms previous photogrammetry-based methods and is second only to the radar-based method, which is considered the most accurate method available.This research was funded by National Science Centre, Poland, project WATERLINE (2020/02/Y/ST10/00065), under the CHISTERA IV programme of the EU Horizon 2020 (Grant no 857925).
Sensitivity analysis of hurricane Paulette with convection-permitting ICON simulations
Authors: Senf Fabian , Cremer Roxana
Published: March 2024

Tropical cyclones are impressive phenomena of tropical meteorology and form spatially highly organised structures. To shed more light on microphysical sensitivities of hurricanes, we present the initial outcomes of a sensitivity analysis of hurricane Paulette simulated with the German weather and climate model ICON. Paulette occurred in the North-Atlantic basin in September 2020 and was simulated with variable settings for model parameterisations and horizontal grid spacings down to hectometre. The study especially explores the microphysical details of the simulated hurricane case. In our examination, we find interesting sensitivities to Cloud Condensation Nuclei (CCN) type and concentration and to vertical resolution. Changes in the top-of-the-atmosphere radiation fluxes are presented in detail. Insights gained from this analysis contribute to the broader understanding of model performance in simulating microphysical processes such as the formation of cloud ice and precipitation.
Spatiotemporal Variability in Hydrological Drought Recovery Time Estimations from GRACE and GRACE-FO Data 
Authors: Çakan Çağatay , Yılmaz M. Tuğrul , Dobslaw Henryk , Evrendilek Fatih , Förste Christoph , Ince E. Sinem , Yağcı Ali L.
Published: March 2024

This study aimed to explore the global spatiotemporal variability in hydrological drought recovery time (DRT) estimated using terrestrial water storage (TWS) and station-based precipitation data. TWS data were gathered from the Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment (GRACE) between April 2002 and June 2017 and GRACE Follow-On (GRACE-FO) between June 2018 and September 2023. The GRACE and GRACE-FO mascon (RL06) solution were used. Precipitation data were obtained from the Global Precipitation Climatology Project (GPCP) monthly analysis product. DRT was derived from the following two approaches: (1) TWS data via storage deficit and (2) TWS and precipitation data via absolute required precipitation. Storage deficit was computed as the negative deviation of detrended TWS from climatological values. Absolute required precipitation to fill the storage deficit was estimated from the linear relationship between the cumulative detrended smoothed precipitation anomalies (cdPA) and detrended smoothed TWS anomalies (dTWSA). The end of hydrological drought was assumed as when TWS deviation turned positive for the first methodology and as when observed precipitation exceeded absolute required precipitation for the second one. Mean DRT values across continents were obtained for both the GRACE and GRACE-FO periods, and the temporal variability between these periods was explored across different continents. On average, DRT estimate was 29% higher during the GRACE period (11.2 months) than during the GRACE-FO period (8.6 months). The TWS-based method (11.5 months) yielded 38% higher DRT than did the TWS- and precipitation-based one (8.3 months). Overall, Australia exhibited the highest DRT estimate (averaging 11.3 months) among all continents for both methods, whereas Europe showed the lowest one (averaging 8.6 months), with a global average of 9.9 months. Analysis of the temporal consistency between DRT estimates from both methods revealed that 28% of estimates aligned during the GRACE period, increasing to 49% during the GRACE-FO period. In particular, the highest consistency (61%) was observed over Africa during GRACE-FO period, contrasting with the lowest consistency (17%) over Australia during the GRACE period. Overall, the consistency between the DRT estimates from the two methods increased from the GRACE period to the GRACE-FO period across all the continents by 18% to 40%, except for Europe, where consistency dropped by 3%. These findings provide insights not only into the potential of TWS data in globally estimating DRT with significant consistency but also into understanding the dynamics of global hydrological droughts, thus proving beneficial in devising management strategies for water resources.
Synthetic spectra of the auroras
Authors: Barthelemy Mathieu , Robert Elisa
Published: March 2024

The auroral emissions are due to electron precipitations into the upper atmosphere in polar regions. These electrons populations, called suprathermal, due to their high energies (10 eV to 50/100 keV) generates some emissions mainly in the green (O I 557 nm), the red (O I 630-636 nm) and the purple (N2+ 427 nm). However the spectra contains much more lines especially molecular bands such as the 1st , 2nd postive bands and the Vegard Kaplan band of molecular nitrogen which produces structured vibrational emissons. It is then important to be able to get quasi exhaustive simulations of these emissions. Based on kinetic calculations from the Transsolo code, we implemented simulations of almost all the visible emissions lines of the auroras parametized by the particle precipitations. The code used MSIS 2.0 as atmospheric model, IRI  2020 for the ionosphere and a very large set of updated cross sections. We propose in this work to present the result of these simulatins in different conditions and to consider the potential uses of such calculations for different auroral physics applications.
Effects of rainfall Intensity-Duration on landslides’ velocity variations: insights from long-term monitoring of case studies in Emilia-Romagna and South Tyrol (Italy)
Authors: Tondo Melissa , Critelli Vincenzo , Mulas Marco , Lelli Francesco , Ciccarese Giuseppe , Truffelli Giovanni , Mair Volkmar , Corsini Alessandro
Published: March 2024

What is known, nowadays, is that shallow landslides are mostly influenced by intense short-duration rainfall events while deep-seated ones are mainly affected by long-duration cumulated rainfall. However, the correlation between precipitation and displacement rates, especially for deep-seated landslides, is still poorly investigated on a quantitative basis. In order to understand the mechanisms of acceleration and deceleration of landslides and how they are related to rainfall regimes, long-term, possibly continuous, monitoring of displacement is essential. This contribute aims to present and discuss this issue based on results from about 15 long-term monitored landslides, ranging from earthslides-earthflows to deep-seated rockslides, located in Emilia-Romagna region and South Tyrol. Displacement time series in these case studies have been collected with different in-situ techniques such as principally periodic and continuous GNSS and Robotic Total Stations (RTS), covering periods up to more than ten years. After analysing displacement plots, each identified acceleration event was correlated to rainfall by considering the last significant precipitation event antecedent to the first date of velocity variation, recorded by local meteo stations. Then, Duration (h) and Intensity (mm/h) were retrieved for each event and an Intensity-Duration (ID) plot was built with all data together. It could be observed that the ID-points were distributed along a line with extremely slow deep-seated landslides on one side and rapid earthslides-earthflows on the other, representing the two opposites of the spectrum. Secondly, another aspect that was considered in this framework is the difference between velocity variations of monitored points (such as GNSS benchmarks or RTS prisms) and the velocity of movement propagation along the landslide body. Examples on this topic are presented from Ca’ Lita and Corvara landslides, located in Emilia-Romagna and South Tyrol, respectively. Landslides response to precipitation events is the result of a complex combination of geological, geomorphological, geotechnical, and meteo-climatic factors. In accordance with ID-points distribution, the lower the surface of movement the lower duration and intensity are needed to enhance instability and displacement rates. On the other hand, the interaction with rainfall is not as immediate for deep-seated landslides, making their interpretation more complex. This study presents (i) a summary of all the recorded velocity variations affecting the proposed case studies, and (ii) an interpretation of their behavior in terms of acceleration and precipitation conditions.
Analysing O3 levels and formation conditions via TROPOMI NO2 and HCHO retrievals for the Aegean Region
Authors: Bayram Sedef , Kaynak Burcak
Published: March 2024

Tropospheric Ozone (O3) is a secondary pollutant formed via non-linear chemistry in the atmosphere with significant impacts on human health, ecosystem and crop production. The spatial distributions of HCHO and NO2 are strongly correlated with emissions of VOCs and NOx, O3 precursors, therefore, a proxy ratio of HCHO/NO2 (FNR) can be an indicator to understand the O3 formation where VOC/NOx ratios are not available. Changes in meteorological conditions, such as wind speed and direction, temperature, and relative humidity can affect the spatial and temporal patterns of O3 and its precursors. The Aegean Region of Turkey with its geographical location, urbanization and industry, and vegetation and agriculture, experiences high O3 levels, given its high number of sunny days throughout the years. However, a comprehensive study in this regard has not been conducted in the region previously. The aim of this study is to investigate the spatial and temporal changes of O3 and to understand the O3 production regime and the relationship with its precursors in the southern Aegean Region.Within the study scope, ground-based NO2 and O3 measurements from the national monitoring network were used for understanding O3 pollution from 2019 to 2023. O3 and NOx (NO, NO2) are measured together at 33 air quality monitoring stations (AQMSs) in the Aegean Clean Air Region of Türkiye. 18% of the AQMSs exceeded EU limit for MDA8 O3 (maximum daily average 8-hr O3 >120 µg/m3, more than average of 25 days exceedance over recent 3 years) while almost 70% of the AQMSs exceeded World Health Organization (WHO) guidelines (>100 µg/m3 as MDA8 O3) in 2023. Manisa-Alasehir, Aydın-Efeler, and Izmir-Seferihisar AQMSs have consistently recorded the highest number of days, exceeding 100 days per year, according to the WHO guidelines. However, NO2 exceedances are limited in the AQMSs with O3 exceedances. Time series and pollution roses of O3 and NO2 were prepared to understand temporal changes along with meteorological parameters for stations with significant O3 problem. TROPOMI NO2 and HCHO retrievals within 6 km of AQMSs were processed, and FNR values were calculated for the same time period. O3 concentrations were examined by FNR values in order to explain O3 formation regimes. FNR values widely ranged in the region and the ozone season (May-September) average FNR values were estimated as 4.0
Cumulative Impact Analysis of Rain Gauge Networks on Rainfall Forecasting Accuracy: A Case Study 
Authors: Nouriabouzari Hossein , Abbasi Ali , Shafiei Mojtaba , Behzadian Kourosh
Published: March 2024

Accurate rainfall estimation is vital for real-time forecasting of water resources used for water demand management. This needs an optimum density of rain gauges. While numerous geostatistical methods exist for optimizing rain gauge networks, many may suffer from limitations. This study aims to develop a novel geostatistical method to redesign rain gauge networks that was demonstrated in a real-world case study of Khorasan Razavi province, specifically in the Qarahqoom basin, Iran, aiming to minimize errors.The methodology involves analyzing the number and locations of rain gauges and assessing each rain station’s contribution to the region’s overall rainfall estimation accuracy. Initially, station homogeneity in the study area is verified using the linear moment method. Subsequently, a suitable semi-variogram is selected to calculate the acceptance probability for different areas within the province. This approach determines acceptance accuracy (AP) values at various probability levels.Considering the basin’s characteristics, including its homogeneity, the acceptance probability method was implemented at an 80% probability level. The findings reveal that current networks of 66 rain gauges achieves a 61% acceptance accuracy. Of these, only 42 rain gauges significantly influence the estimated basin rainfall (i.e. forming the base network) while the remaining 24 rain gauges have a minor impact (i.e. non-base network). It is proposed that adding 24 strategically placed stations could evaluate the rainfall estimation accuracy in the Qaraqoom basin to 95%.Keywords: Rain gauge network, variogram, acceptance probability, acceptance accuracy, Qarahqoom basin
Towards Live, Nation Wide, Farm-Level  Crop Monitoring 
Authors: Deshpande Ishan , Reehal Amandeep Kaur , Singh Gaurav , Nath Chandan , Singh Renu , Talekar Alok
Published: March 2024

Accurate and timely information about expected crop production is crucial for various applications including agricultural monitoring, policy making, and food security assessment. Policy makers can use near-real time crop maps to better determine crop support prices, storage infrastructure, and imports. In the context of India, absence of farm-level crop maps r the government to work with aggregate statistics based on manual surveys, and therefore are fundamentally limited in scale and accuracy. Surveys over large regions such as entire states or countries are slow and provide information only after large delays. Indian farms also go through up to three crop rotations a year necessitating continual monitoring. We put forward a nation-wide, farm-level, weekly agricultural monitoring and event detection model for the study area of India. Our model leverages remote sensing and machine learning to build a crop map that allows us to accurately monitor individual farms across large areas. We utilize the rich spectral and temporal information provided by Sentinel-2 satellite to provide near-real time crop monitoring, including sowing, crop type, and harvesting information. The predictions are done on an individual farm level with farm boundaries coming from a field segmentation model. Making predictions on a farm level scale helps getting more accurate yield estimates and allows monitoring individual fields for credit, insurance, resource allocation, etc. Currently, the model is able to identify major winter crops with an accuracy of up to 80% as early as 2 months after sowing. Equipped with the ability to provide weekly sowing and harvesting information makes the model near-real time for agricultural purposes. We also demonstrate the scalability of the model by showing results pan-India, across several diverse agro climatic zones. The model successfully generalizes to many unseen regions without requiring regional data. Using satellite data to provide accurate and timely crop cover information has the potential of saving millions of dollars spent by the government on manual surveys.
Shallow sources of upper mantle seismic anisotropy in East Africa 
Authors: Ebinger Cynthia , Reiss Miriam , Bastow Ian , Karanja Mary
Published: March 2024

The East African rift overlies one or more mantle upwellings and it traverses heterogeneous Archaean-Paleozoic lithosphere rifted in Mesozoic and Cenozoic time. We re-analyze XKS shear wave splitting at publicly available stations to evaluate models for rifting above mantle plumes. We use consistent criteria to compare and contrast both splitting direction and strength, infilling critical gaps with new data from the Turkana Depression and North Tanzania Divergence sectors of the East African rift system. Our results show large spatial variations in the amount of splitting (0.1–2.5 s) but consistent orientations of the fast axes within rift zones: they are predominantly sub-parallel to the orientation of Cenozoic rifts underlain by thinned lithosphere with and without surface magmatism. The amount of splitting increases with lithospheric thinning and magmatic modification. Nowhere are fast axes perpendicular to the rift, arguing against the development of extensional strain fabrics. Thick cratons are characterized by small amounts of splitting (≤0.5 s) with a variety of orientations that may characterize mantle plume flow. Splitting rotates to rift parallel and increases in strength over short distances into rift zones, implying a shallow depth range for the anisotropy in some places. The shallow source and correlation between splitting direction and the shape of upper mantle thin zones suggests that the combination of channel flow and oriented melt pockets contribute > 1 s to the observed splitting delays. Enhanced flow, metasomatism, and melt intrusion at the lithosphere-asthenosphere boundary suggest that fluid infiltration to the base of the lithosphere may facilitate rifting of cratonic lithosphere. 
Advancing Planetary Boundary Science
Authors: Caesar Levke , Kitzmann Niklas , Rockström Johan
Published: March 2024

While Planetary Boundary science has advanced tremendously over the past decades, we still lack a deep understanding of the intricate, yet pivotal connections between many biological and physical functions of the Earth system. This is of grave concern, since the stability of the planet and interactions between its components are the foundation of human civilization. Moreover, as it stands, science only has the resources to measure and analyze the planet’s vital signs every 6-8 years (Rockström et al. 2009, Steffen et al. 2015, Richardson et al., 2003), and our imperfect measurement framework has some worrying blind spots.To address these challenges, the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research and its partners are launching a major scientific effort to close the knowledge gaps, both in terms of our ability to model how the Earth system evolves under the pressure of human activity, as well as our ability to measure the state of the Earth system with high temporal resolution. This will culminate in an annual Planetary Boundary (PB) Health Check, conceived and reviewed by a diverse international scientific and stakeholder community. Employing cutting-edge Earth-system and tipping-point modelling, ambitious whole-Earth monitoring, and exploring artificial-intelligence-based big-data analytics, the Health Check shall offer a comprehensive, timely, and unparalleled assessment of the planet's health. With yearly updates of PB transgressions at its core, the Health Check will further develop the boundary measures themselves and provide important context, e.g. via case studies and policy implications.  It will reveal current risks due to ongoing transgression of PBs and develop transformation pathways to guide global development back to Earth’s safe operating space. Besides peer-reviewed publications, these results will be communicated to the public using state-of-the-art visualizations and communication partnerships.In this presentation we will give details about this new science initiative, the partners we work with, out short and long-term goals and give an overview of involvement opportunities in this rapidly growing project.ReferencesRockström, J., Steffen, W., Noone, K. et al. A safe operating space for humanity. Nature 461, 472–475 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1038/461472aSteffen, W. et al. ,Planetary boundaries: Guiding human development on a changing planet.Science347,1259855(2015).DOI:10.1126/science.1259855 Richardson, K. et al., Earth beyond six of nine planetary boundaries.Sci. Adv.9,eadh2458(2023).DOI:10.1126/sciadv.adh2458
Chemical characterization of sub-micrometer marine aerosol around the Ross Sea during CAIAC (2022-23 Antarctic summer)
Authors: Rinaldi Matteo , Paglione Marco , Rapuano Marco , Fellin Diego , Decesari Stefano , Losi Niccolò , Ferrero Luca , Lupi Angelo
Published: March 2024

Remote from most human influences, the Southern Ocean (SO) is one of the most pristine regions on Earth and a window to preindustrial atmospheric conditions (Hamilton, 2015). Currently, many unknowns remain about atmospheric and oceanographic processes in this region and their relations. This is largely due to the poor understanding of aerosol sources and processes in this region.Sub-micrometer aerosol samples were collected onboard the Italian RV Laura Bassi cruising the Southern Ocean and the Ross Sea, in the framework of the PNRA (Programma Nazionale di Ricerca in Antartide) project CAIAC (oCean Atmosphere Interactions in the Antarctic regions and Convergence latitude). The aim is to characterize the marine aerosol chemical composition in different ecoregions, with a particular interest for organic aerosols and their formation processes in relation with the patterns of oceanic biological activity.Samples were collected by a high volume sampler (TECORA, ECHO-HIVOL, 500 LMP) from mid-January to mid-February 2023, deploying a wind direction selection system to avoid ship contaminations. A total of 9 samples were collected. The samples have been analysed for their water-soluble Carbon and Nitrogen content by a C-N elemental analyzer (Shimadzu) and for the ionic composition (including low molecular weight acids and amines) by ion chromatography (Dionex). The characterization of the water-soluble organic fraction in terms of tracers and functional group abundance was performed by 1H NMR (Proton Nuclear Magnetic Resonance) spectroscopy (Decesari et al, 2020).The samples show variable contributions in terms of primary and secondary components, mostly depending on back trajectory origin and wind speed, with a general predominance of secondary species. Sulfate resulted generally the most abundant aerosol component, while water soluble organic matter (WSOM) showed a non-negligible contribution from 5 to 14% of the analysed mass. NMR spectra show the complexity of the WSOM composition, even though all the spectra were dominated by the MSA signal, which contribution in terms of carbon to WSOM spans from 8 to 64%.Analysis of organic aerosol sources is in progress by back-trajectory analysis and statistical analysis of the NMR spectra. Acknowledgements: CAIAC (oCean Atmosphere Interactions in the Antarctic regions and Convergence latitude) PNRA project. Decesari, S. et al. (2020), Atmos. Chem. Phys., 20, 4193–4207, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-20-4193-2020Hamilton, D. S. Weather 2015, 70 (9), 264– 8, DOI: 10.1002/wea.254
Semi-or fully automatic drainage regulation as a mean to recharge groundwater
Authors: Venuleo Sara , Unrau Silas , Staufer Philipp , Lebrenz Henning
Published: March 2024

Climatic change is decreasing water availability, all over the world. Regions which never faced water scarcity need to adapt their practises to face more frequent and severe droughts periods. Among others, agriculture is one of the sectors that will face the consequences of water scarcity. Indeed, while water availability decreases, the use of water for irrigation purposes becomes questionable.In many regions in Europe, cultivated areas have a sub-surface drainage system, which ensures that crops do not face water stress due to excessive soil water content. These drainage systems convey the water infiltrating during rainfall events to surface channels, reducing the natural water table recharge.Introducing drainage regulations units in existing drainage systems represent a mean to increase the soil water retention and, consequently, a mean to increase the natural water table recharge while decreasing the need of irrigation and while helping to reduce peak flow during intense rainfall events. Moreover, controlled drainage management can reduce the amount of Nitrogen and Plant Protection Products (PPP) discharged into surface waters.Given its environmental benefits, drainage water management is today an official conservation practice in the USA and the Conservation Practice Standard 554 (code 554) has been published by the United States Department of Agriculture to inform, advice and guide potential users of this practise.Drainage control units can be simple structures retrofitted in existing drainage networks outlets. They can consist of sliding weir systems or of a flashboard with adjustable height and they can be operated manually or automatically.In the present study an automatic drainage control unit has been developed and operated in a laboratory prototype. The objective of our experiment was understanding which technical and practical difficulties are faced in the use of a drainage control unit and thus which issues hinder its spread among farmers. Particular attention was given to possible issues associated with sedimentation.