bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Positive feedback between rates of rock mass weathering and landscape lowering through fluvial and hillslope erosion in the High Himalaya of Bhutan
Authors: de Palézieux Larissa , Leith Kerry , Loew Simon
Published: March 2022

River systems provide a primary means of sediment production and transport in mountain environments. While sediment transport is mainly governed by stream power, the rate of rock mass weathering is a function of rock mechanical properties and the local climatic conditions. Here, we investigate the interaction between fluvial incision and weathering rates in two alpine catchments in the NW of Bhutan. The study region is characterized by three distinct geomorphic domains including broad alluvial plains, with detachment-limited regimes, transport-limited fluvial valleys with steep hillslopes and high relief, and glacially overprinted low-relief landscapes at the foot of the High Himalayan peaks. The two major drainage basins, the Wong Chhu basin in the West and the Puna Tsang Chhu basin in the East, both traverse these geomorphic domains, yet show marked differences in profile view, with the alluvial plain of the Wong Chhu basin located 1000 m higher than the Puna Tsang Chhu basin.

In this study we combine river profile analyses with records of rock mass weathering and mapped morphological markers regarding the spatial extent of erosional regimes (past and present extent of alluvial infill and maximum glacial extent) to reconstruct the relative sequence of erosional events generating the present-day topography of the two basins. We find characteristic gradients in the degree of rock mass weathering throughout the hillslopes with fresh outcrops close to the river network and weathering grade increasing with elevation above the river channel. We interpret the higher degrees of weathering to represent the additional time available for rock mass weathering in parts of the landscape distal to the ongoing fluvial incision. While the general pattern of rock mass weathering is similar between the two basins, we observe on average higher degrees of weathering in the eastern basin (Puna Tsang Chhu). While the difference in elevation of 1000 m between the two basins suggests a larger volume of sediment having been eroded in Puna Tsang Chhu, we suggest the topographic lowering of this basin and the subsequent climatic changes (increases in mean annual temperature and total annual precipitation) to result in increased rates of rock mass weathering, which outpace those of fluvial incision.
Monitoring mesoplastic concentrations in estuarine waters: A case study in the River Guadalquivir (Southern Spain)
Authors: González-Fernández Daniel , Manzano-Medina Sandra , González-Duarte Manuel M. , Cózar Andrés
Published: March 2022

Rivers act as pathways transporting anthropogenic waste from inland sources to the sea, including large quantities of plastic. Estuaries are rich and diverse environments where the interaction between fluvial processes and the tidal regime results in complex dynamics that affects residence time and net transport plastics in the water column. The use of plankton nets (small mesh sizes, e.g. < 500 µm) to collect microplastic samples allows characterizing plastic particles of different sizes. At the same time, given the variability in plastic particles abundance, the limitation in number of samples and/or volume filtered per sample, may cause a large bias in such characterization. Generally, particle abundance decreases toward larger particle sizes, and therefore the collection of representative samples for a certain plastic size range depends on sampling effort. Here, we analyze abundance and weight of micro- (< 5mm) and mesoplastics (5-25 mm) collected in estuarine waters at the River Guadalquivir through bi-monthly monitoring over one year. Our results demonstrate that establishing ratios between micro- and meso-plastics concentrations can lead to large uncertainties when a limited number of samples is used in the analysis, causing strong bias in the extrapolation of mass budgets for mesoplastics. Collecting representative samples for mesoplastics implies a change in the current monitoring methods to specifically target such particle size range.
To what extent do slip rates contribute to the seismic activity of faults?
Authors: Tavakolizadeh Nasrin , Mohammadigheymasi Hamzeh , Matias Luís , Silveira Graça , Fernandes Rui , Dolatabadi Nima
Published: March 2022

Crustal deformation comprises a combination of seismic energy release occurring by earthquakes and aseismic unloading through creeping or frictional sliding. Efficient segregation of the seismic component attributed to faults is critical in evaluating Seismic Activity Rate (SAR) or Magnitude Frequency Distribution (MFD) of earthquakes in fault-based hazard assessment. The MFDs are routinely calculated by utilizing fault geometry and slip rate, evaluated from geodetic (or geological) data. The slip rates as an integrated representation of elastic and anelastic loadings overestimate the MFDs since earthquakes release only the elastic strain. To work around this problem, the seismic/geodetic moment-rate ratio defined as Seismic Coupling Coefficient (SCC) is incorporated in this study to account for the seismic portion of the total moment rate to calculate MFDs. The parameter has been studied for different tectonic regions worldwide, including the USA, Canada, Iran, Greece, and Italy. We modify the Moment Budget (MB) algorithm introduced by Pace et al. (2016) to weight the total moment rate corresponding to the maximum magnitude (Mmax) generated by the modeled faults by incorporating the SCC. An updated mean recurrence time (Tmean) for the Mmax and its corresponding uncertainty is computed when SCC is incorporated in the calculation. Then, the seismic moment, the SCC weighted Tmean, and its uncertainty are utilized to compute MFDs by balancing the modeled seismic moment rates (by Doubly Truncated Gutenberg-Richter (DTGR) or Characteristic Gaussian (CHG)) and the SCC weighted moment rates. This process is implemented by the Activity Rates (AR) tool of FiSH codes. Fault data of 89 fault segments in Zagros, Iran, are introduced into the algorithm to compute the SCC incorporated MFDs. The acquired fault-based hazard maps are in harmony with the history of seismicity and tectonics of the region, while the total moment rates exaggerate the calculated hazard. Future work involves implementing the processing algorithm on hazard assessment in the Gulf of Guinea. This research contributes to the FCT-funded SHAZAM (Ref. PTDC/CTA-GEO/31475/2017), IDL (Ref. FCT/UIDB/50019/2020), and SIGHT (Ref. PTDC/CTA-GEF/30264/2017) projects. It also uses computational resources provided by C4G (Collaboratory for Geosciences) (Ref. PINFRA/22151/2016).
Beneath the surface: Climatic, Micro-climatic, Geochemical and Microbiological Approach to Karstic Cave Ecosystem
Authors: Tok Ezgi , Olğun Kıyak Nazlı
Published: March 2022

As semi-closed ecosystems, biotic and abiotic properties of cave environments are extensively isolated from the impacts of the surface processes, except for a few environmental parameters. Surface climatic parameters (atmospheric CO2 ratio, temperature, and precipitation amount) and vegetation are known with their impact on the environmental parameters such as the CO2 partial pressure, temperature, and humidity of the cave atmosphere. These properties of cave microclimate are defined over a long-term process of balancing all the input and output heat and mass fluxes under the influence of soil temperature, seepage water content and the chemical/physical properties of sinking streams as well as direct air flux from the outside into the cave. While this interaction between the surface and in-cave environmental parameters exerts a key factor on the hydro/geochemical, and microbiological properties of the cave by altering the biotic and abiotic conditions, cave environments can be considered as long-term archives of the consequences of this interaction by being highly sheltered to the surface processes. This relationship between sediment geochemistry, microbiology and environmental conditions is still not fully understood.

In this study, the relationship between bacterial diversity, sediment geochemistry, and microclimate as three major components of cave ecosystems will be examined in cave environments, the relationship between in-cave and surface atmospheric conditions as well. In order to determine the in-cave environmental conditions, micro-climatic (CO2, temperature, humidity) and environmental (cave water pH, alkalinity) parameters were measured during the fieldwork. Sediment and water (drip water, underground river water and pond water) were sampled in two seasons (summer and winter) aseptically as triplet to determine bacterial community composition of these caves. Water, sediment, and speleothem samples from the caves were examined by Inductively Coupled Plasma - Mass Spectrometry (ICP-MS) and Next Generation Sequencing (NGS) methods to reveal the geochemical and metagenomic features. To observe the changes in cave micro-climate for a year-long period, dataloggers were used.
Highlight results of the Smart4RES project on weather modelling and forecasting dedicated to renewable energy applications
Authors: Kariniotakis Georges , Camal Simon ,   Smart4RES team
Published: March 2022

In this presentation we detail highlight results obtained from the research work within the European Horizon 2020 project Smart4RES (http://www.smart4res.eu). The project, which started in 2019 and runs until 2023, aims at a better modelling and forecasting of weather variables necessary to optimise the integration of weather-dependent renewable energy (RES) production (i.e. wind, solar, run-of-the-river hydro) into power systems and electricity markets. Smart4RES gathers experts from several disciplines, from meteorology and renewable generation to market- and grid-integration. It aims to contribute to the pathway towards energy systems with very high RES penetrations by 2030 and beyond, through thematic objectives including:

Improvement of weather and RES forecasting,

Streamlined extraction of optimal value through new forecasting products, data market places, and novel business models;

New data-driven optimization and decision-aid tools for market and grid management applications;

Validation of new models in living labs and assessment of forecasting value vs costly remedies to hedge uncertainties (i.e. storage). 

In this presentation we will focus on our results on models that permit to improve forecasting of weather variables with focus on extreme situations and also through innovative measuring settings (i.e. a network of sky cameras). Also results will be presented on the development of seamless approach able to couple outputs from different ensemble numerical weather prediction (NWP) models with different temporal resolutions. Advances on the contribution of ultra-high resolution NWPs based on Large Eddy Simulation will be presented with evaluation results on real case studies like the Rhodes island in Greece.

When it comes to forecasting the power output of RES plants, mainly wind and solar, the focus is on improving predictability using multiple sources of data. The proposed modelling approaches aim to efficiently combine highly dimensionally input (various types of satellite images, numerical weather predictions, spatially distributed measurements etc.). A priority has been to propose models that permit to generate probabilistic forecasts for multiple time frames in a seamless way. Thus, the objective is not only to improve accuracy and uncertainty estimations, but also to simplify complex forecasting modelling chains for applications that use forecasts at different time frames (i.e. a virtual power plant - VPP- with or without storage that participates in multiple markets). Our results show that the proposed seamless models permit to reach these performance objectives. Results will be presented also on how these approaches can be extended to aggregations of RES plants which is relevant for forecasting VPP production.
JEDI overview of Juno’s first close Ganymede flyby
Authors: Clark George ,   Juno Team
Published: March 2022

On 7 June 2021, the Juno spacecraft made its first close flyby of Jupiter’s largest moon—Ganymede—at an altitude of ~1045 km. Additionally, this is the first spacecraft encounter with Ganymede’s space environment since the Galileo spacecraft over two decades earlier. Juno is equipped with an energetic particle instrument suite that is comprised of three sensors for optimal angular coverage on a sub-spacecraft spin basis. Here we report measurements from Juno’s Jupiter Energetic particle Detector Instrument or JEDI for short. Energetic particle observations associated with Ganymede’s magnetosphere depict the following: 1) a dynamic and structured transition between Jupiter’s environment to Ganymede’s magnetosphere; 2) evidence for precipitation onto Ganymede’s surface within the open field line region as a possible consequence of wave-particle interactions; 3) empty upward loss cones indicative of strong absorption by Ganymede’s surface; and 4) a radiation cavity around Ganymede where intensities are smaller compared to the Jovian environment.
Exploring Uncertainty Surrounding Deep Decarbonization Pathways: Application to Colombia
Authors: Zhao Mengqi , Wild Thomas , Yarlagadda Brinda , Clarke Leon , Iyer Gokul
Published: March 2022

Limiting end-of-century temperature rise to 1.5-2 degrees C will require achieving net-zero CO2 emissions globally by 2050. Toward this goal, the Government of Colombia (GoC) is crafting a portfolio of actions (i.e., a mid-century strategy) that will not only substantially reduce emissions but also perform well across a range of societal objectives, despite the many uncertainties to which those actions will be exposed. In collaboration with a diverse array of stakeholders, here we seek to discover which actions hold promise for Colombia to achieve its climate and other societal objectives under a range of future uncertainties. The most effective mix of actions from Colombia’s perspective maybe those that create a solid near-term foundation for future ambitious action, and also those that avoid poor performance (across multiple societal objectives) under future uncertainty. This presentation will identify key elements of a robust decarbonization strategy for Colombia, and understand which sources of uncertainty may be critical to acknowledge and better understand.

It is not possible to assign meaningful probabilities to scenarios that consist of complex combinations of policy actions (i.e., levers) and uncertainties. However, it is possible to discover which scenarios, or combinations of levers and uncertainties, drive consequential outcomes across societal objectives. We use the “XLRM” conceptual organizing framework for defining this immense challenge and its possible solutions in Colombia, including: policy levers ("L"), such as renewable portfolio standards and electric vehicles deployment; future uncertainties ("X") such as socioeconomic change, technological change, and climatic change; and metrics ("M") for evaluating the relevant societal outcomes that result from the implementation of levers in uncertain future worlds, such as air quality, food security, water security, energy access, land use change, and economic development. To map policy levers to key outcomes (metrics) under uncertainty, we use the Global Change Analysis Model (GCAM) v5.3 to explore the order of 10,000 GCAM scenarios reflecting diverse futures. The study focuses on a set of questions, and a methodological approach, that have immediate relevance to Colombia but also broader applications both within Latin America and beyond to the rest of the world.
Assessing interactions between preferential flow and antibiotic transport in soils
Authors: Stewart Ryan , Radolinski Jesse
Published: March 2022

Organic contaminants such as antibiotics are being applied to soils in increasing loads. These chemicals can be rapidly transported via preferential flow, making it important to understand and quantify soil-solute interactions under bypass flow conditions. In this study we applied deuterium-labeled rainfall to field plots containing manure spiked with eight common antibiotics, and collected pore water samples from 48 suction cups spread along a hillslope. In total we collected more than 700 measurements across the eight antibiotics. Our results indicated that solute transport to lysimeters was similar between antibiotics when preferential flow was less than 15%. When preferential flow exceeded 15%, however, compounds with relatively low affinity for soil were sampled in higher concentrations, suggesting that preferential flow mobilizes compounds that are more easily released from the soil matrix. Our findings show that extensive preferential flow can enhance, rather than reduce, the influence of chemical properties. These data provide new insight into how flow heterogeneity affects pollutant mobility in soils and can be used to build more accurate process-based transport models.
Simulating the interaction between a turbulent solar wind and bodies of the solar system.
Authors: Behar Etienne , Henri Pierre
Published: March 2022

Menura, a  newly developped hybrid PIC code, allows the self-consistent simulation between a turbulent upstream flow and an obstacle. A global view of such interactions is a novel product which allows us to diagnose both the impact of the additional turbulent energy on the obstacle, and the evolution of the turbulence when processed by planetary boundaries. We present the examples of exospheres (comets, at various heliocentric distances) and ionospheres (Mars-like obstacle). We find that the boundaries are changed in size, and present a much more dynamic behaviour. New plasma structures appear within the magnetospheres due to the impinging perpendicular magnetic field fluctuations, piling up and draping around the dense ionospheres/exospheres (see Figure). The spectral content is also extracted from within the magnetospheres, providing a strong comparison point with experimental studies of magnetospheric turbulence.

 

<img src="https://contentmanager.copernicus.org/fileStorageProxy.php?f=gnp.72ca9db266e169058842461/sdaolpUECMynit/22UGE&app=m&a=0&c=47d0b90e4348324577b7ab987245f258&ct=x&pn=gnp.elif&d=1" alt="" width="1055" height="765">
A new perception in the development, failure, and hyper-mobility of a giant rock avalanche in the suture zone
Authors: Gao Yunjian , Zhao Siyuan
Published: March 2022

Giant rock avalanche is extremely rare worldwide, while giant rock avalanche developed in suture zone has presented unique development characteristics. The suture zone is a product of plate moving and strong tectonic activity, where the appearance of a giant avalanche not only plays a barometer role for the regional disaster development environment but an indicator role for the complicated geological environment. In 2019-2021, the author has found a giant paleo-rock avalanche (name Basu avalanche) in the Bangonghu-Nujiang suture zone of the Tibetan Plateau. Some infrequent characteristics such as huge volume, development in nappe structure, and hyper-mobility (debris impact height > 600m) appeared for this giant rock avalanche. In this paper, based on the detailed investigation, 36Cl dating, and reconstructing the pre-avalanche terrain methods, the development, failure, and hyper-mobility of this giant rock avalanche have been analyzed. The result shows that: (1) The volume of the Basu avalanche is about 3.5×109m3, the residue is about 1.4×109m3 now. The avalanche occurred at 205.70±7.71ka B.P.(ka: millennium), subsequent the accumulation body occurred two times secondary landslides (name Duolasi landslide) at 17.57±0.72ka B.P. and 7.01±0.32ka B.P., respectively; (2) The nappe structure, formed from the uplift and orogeny process of the suture zone, controls the development and volume size of the Basu avalanche, while the strong earthquake is the biggest likely to trigger the avalanche finally failure because of the dense active faults distribution; (3) Because of the rich Ultrabasic clasts derived from the F2 fault and fine particles produced by cataclastic rock mass, the Basu avalanche formed the slide belt that thickness from centimeters to meters during the motion. The lubrication effect of the slide belt has dominated the avalanche debris's high-speed motion and hyper-mobility, the mechanism is that: due to the huge avalanche volume and induced the high pressure and closed slide belt environment, the slide belt fine-grain formed the lubrication layer with certain water involved, and the friction force sharply decreased; (4) Because of the Basu rock avalanche and the debris flow successive blocked the Leng River, the Leng River valley has experienced diversions process and the river valley from the ’S’ shape to approximate straight-line shape.
Spatial and temporal long-range dependence in the scale domain
Authors: Dimitriadis Panayiotis , Iliopoulou Theano , Sargentis G.-Foivos , Koutsoyiannis Demetris
Published: March 2022

Long-range dependence (LRD) estimators are traditionally applied in the lag domain (e.g., through the autocovariance or variogram) or in the frequency domain (e.g., through the power-spectrum), but not as often in the scale domain (e.g., through variance vs. scale). It has been contended that the latter case introduces large estimation bias and thus, corresponds to "bad estimators" of the LRD. However, this reflects a misrepresentation or misuse of the concept of variance vs. scale. Specifically, it is shown that if the LRD estimator of variance vs. scale is properly defined and assessed (see literature studies for the so-called climacogram estimator), then the stochastic analysis of variance in the scale domain can be proven to be a robust means to identify and model any LRD process ranging from small scales (fractal behavior) to large scales (LRD, else known as the Hurst-Kolmogorov dynamics) for any marginal distribution. Here, we show how the above definitions can be applied both in spatial and temporal scales, with various applications in geophysical processes, key hydrological-cycle processes, and related natural hazards.
Infrasound detection of avalanches: operational experience from 26 systems in Canada, Switzerland and Norway - individual and multi-array based approaches
Authors: Ulivieri Giacomo , Vezzosi Sandro , Steinkogler Walter , Dreier Lisa
Published: March 2022

During the winter seasons 2019-2020 and 2020-2021 as well as during the current season 26 avalanche infrasound detection systems (IDA®) were used by Parks Canada, the Norwegian Road Administration and Swiss cantons as support for operational decision making to minimize avalanche risk. In this period, more than 800 controlled avalanches and 2700 natural avalanches were detected and delivered in near-real-time to avalanche teams.

Operational efficiency of the Trans-Canada Highway (BC) in the winter months is highly dependent on effective avalanche control. Here the goal of infrasound technology is to provide the Glacier National Park avalanche control team with information on avalanche activity in specific avalanche sectors and paths to reduce avalanche related road closure times. Infrasound technology has also been successfully applied in sparsely vegetated terrain at high altitudes and latitudes such as in Norway, where the Norwegian Public Roads Administration operates infrasound systems along remote road sections where visual observations are difficult to gather. Experiences from regional avalanche forecasting teams in Switzerland where multiple arrays are distributed over a larger area are also presented.

In this work we want to give an overview of results obtained from the use of infrasound technology with particular focus on advantages and limitations encountered in various operational contexts. Recent results of ongoing developments such as multi array processing are also presented.
Quantifying soil complexity using Fisher Information of 3d X-ray CT scan images
Authors: Stosic Borko , Albuquerque-Aguiar Jose , Menezes Romulo , Dantas-Antonino Antonio , Stosic Tatijana , Tarquis Ana M.
Published: March 2022

Degradation of soils due to land use change driven by economic factors represents a major concern in many parts of the world. Important questions regarding soil degradation demand further efforts to better understand the effect of land use change on soil functions. With the advent of 3d Computer Tomography techniques and computing power, new methods are becoming available to address these questions. In this work, we investigate how land use change affects soil structure by using information theory to quantify the complexity of soil 3d X-ray CT soil samples in northeastern Brazil. We implement the Fisher-Shannon method, borrowed from information theory, to quantify the complexity of 14 3d CT soil samples from native Atlantic forest sites, and15 samples from nearby sites converted to sugarcane plantation. The distinction found between the samples from the Atlantic forest and the sugarcane plantation is found to be quite pronounced. The discrimination results at the level of 89.6% accuracy were obtained in terms of Fisher information measure (FIM) alone, and 93% level accuracy was attained considering the complexity in the Fisher Shannon plane (FSP). Atlantic forest samples are found to be generally more complex than those from the sugar plantation. The approach introduced in the current work does not use arbitrary parameters, and it provides a rather precise quantitative FSP complexity measure, that may be seen as a quantifier of soil degradation level.
Remote new particle formation dominates the nucleation and Aitken aerosol modes in the central Arctic
Authors: Price Ruth , Baccarini Andrea , Schmale Julia , Zieger Paul , Brooks Ian , Field Paul , Carslaw Ken
Published: March 2022

The aerosol budget of the Arctic plays a key role in determining the behaviour of clouds, which are important for the surface energy balance and thus for the region’s climate. A key question is the extent to which cloud condensation nuclei in the high Arctic summertime boundary layer are controlled by local emission and formation processes or by transport from outside. Each of these sources is likely to respond differently to future changes in ice cover. Here we use a global model and observations from ship and aircraft field campaigns to understand the source of high-Arctic aerosol in late summer. We find that particles formed remotely are the dominant source of boundary layer Aitken mode particles during the sea ice melt period up to the end of August. Such a remote particle source, mostly entrained from the free troposphere, explains the remarkably stable nucleation mode concentrations of around 100 cm-3. This source from outside the high Arctic declines as photochemical rates decrease towards the end of summer, and is largely replaced by local new particle formation driven by iodic acid associated with freeze up. Such a local source is consistent with strong fluctuations in nucleation mode concentrations that occur in September. Our results suggest a high Arctic aerosol regime shift in late summer, and only after this shift do cloud condensation nuclei become sensitive to local aerosol processes.
Investigating a redistribution of naturally occurring radioactive material (NORM) in dwelling walls
Authors: Fohlmeister Jens , Hoffmann Bernd
Published: March 2022

Depending on their concentration, naturally occurring radioactive materials (NORM) used for the construction of walls in living rooms may contribute elevated levels of radiation exposure for inhabitants. The main path of exposure by building materials is thought to be due to gamma radiation of 40K and the progenies of the 238U and 232Th decay chains. Many efforts have been focused on developing computational methodologies to evaluate and predict the indoor gamma dose rate. Those studies investigated factors such as concrete density or wall thickness of the material as well as factors relating to the dimensions of the room with respect to gamma ray exposure.

Here, we re-implemented a well-established room model (Mustonen, 1984). This model approximates the gamma ray exposure at any point in a model room by accounting for the source strength, radiation absorption by concrete including build-up factors and the 1/r2 decrease due to the distance to the source. The results of our re-implemented model compare well with other models, which focus on the radiation exposure in the midpoint of the room. In addition to concrete density and wall thickness, we focus our investigation on a non-homogenous distribution of NORM in walls, ceiling and floors. We compare different configurations of NORM distributions with respect to the radiation exposure in the room centre and with the average received within the room at a height of 1.25m.

References:

Mustonen, R. (1984). Methods for evaluation of radiation from building materials. Radiation Protection Dosimetry 7, 235-238.

 
Land degradation risk assessment using NDVI Landsat derived images – application in the hilly area of NE Romania
Authors: Văculișteanu Georgiana , Margarint Mihai Ciprian , Niculita Mihai
Published: March 2022

Land degradation represents a complex concept to quantify, especially in today's global context of climate change. During the last decades, a reduction of land quality has been recorded globally, and literature indicates that climate change and human activities are the most significant factors. To properly assess and mitigate this global problem, several remote sensing techniques are developed mainly to classify the grassland quality, which became a valuable indicator of the state of land degradation.

Nowadays, remote sensing indices are used to evaluate and predict scenarios in matters of land degradation state and evolution. Hence, land cover changes, desertification and deforestation, drought monitoring, soil erosion, and salinization are successfully analyzed using the Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI). This index is the most efficiently used vegetation indicator to detect the vegetation dynamics and other problem-related to this phenomenon.

Our study aims to analyze the grassland dynamic to assess the land degradation risk in the north-eastern lowlands of Romania. During the last century, the area was characterized by successive land reforms that translated to a heterogeneous diversity of grassland exploitation. The socio-economic development has brought, besides land management deficiencies, many other problems related to land ownership, land abandonment, mowing frequency, or grazing intensity. To fulfill our objective, we use the 30m spatial resolution Landsat satellite archive within the Google Earth Engine platform to detect and monitor the regions with high fluctuation of the NDVI values. The investigated period starts in 2000 until 2021.

Correlating the historical background evolution of the land use in NE Romania, with the NDVI time series and the climatic data, has revealed that both human-induced activities and climate change are impacting the grassland dynamics. The mismanagement of the land use intensification process has led to degradation and irreversible changes inside the ecosystem.
Arctic temperature persistence and seasonal forecasting
Authors: Ekrami Negar , Olafsson Haraldur
Published: March 2022

Persistence in mean monthly temperatures may be regarded as a baseline for subseasonal to seasonal temperature prediction and it reveals the character of regional climate and climate variability.  The present study of temperature persistence is based on long-term observations in the circumpolar Arctic and it reveals large variability, ranging from very high persistence to negative correlation between adjacent months.  Much of the pattern may be explained with reference to variability in sea ice and snow cover, and the thermal qualities of the surface of the earth.  There are also indications of regional scale circulation feedbacks that may not remain the same in a changing climate.      
Automated platform for detecting and mapping crop diseases using UAV and Artificial Intelligence
Authors: Vilcea Alexandru-Lucian , Dardala Marian , Sandric Ionut-Cosmin
Published: March 2022

With the increase of the world’s population, the constant growth in food demand generates the need to find new ways of optimizing agricultural workflows. Today, a wide variety of software is dedicated to precision agriculture that helps the farmers gather data otherwise hardly available and extract information to minimize crop losses or prevent diseases. However, these solutions hardly allow a complete workflow from gathering the images, processing the datasets, and mapping and detecting the crop diseases. The solutions can be precisely applied where needed, without the need of manually exchanging information between applications. In this paper, we are proposing an architecture as well as a possible implementation for a web platform that can manage such workflows. The platform was implemented using ASP.NET Core 3.1 with C# as the main programming language. Following the best practices in terms of maintainability, the integration with third-party software was developed using proxy components that implement each components’ SDK or API, making these external solutions easily interchangeable. The first module presented in the paper covers the integration of third-party UAV controlling platforms. We integrated the UgCS commercial solution using the provided .NET SDK for our scenario. The data gathered by the UAVs controlled by this module, consisting of RGB, thermal and multispectral images, were stored using Azure Blob Storage cloud service. The location of each image data was acquired by extracting the XMP metadata and further stored using a PostgreSQL database with the PostGIS extension. Next, we provided a way to automatically generate the orthophoto imagery from the acquired data by integrating the Python API available in Agisoft Metashape. Lastly, using the products obtained from the previous step, we calculated different vegetation indices of the analyzed fields using C# and analyzed the outcomes using deep-learning models to identify and map vegetation health states. The platform has been implemented and tested for several case studies located across Romania, reaching satisfactory results.
The evolution of lunar rock size-frequency distributions: An updated model
Authors: Ruesch Ottaviano , Marshal Rachael M. , Iqbal Wajiha , Pasckert Jan Hendrik , van der Bogert Carolyn H. , Patzek Markus
Published: March 2022

The model for the catastrophic rupture of rocks on the lunar surface [1] is revisited by considering new functions describing rock shattering by impacts and size-frequency distributions of meteoroids. The input functions are calibrated by comparing the model block size–frequency distributions with the measured size–frequency distribution of ejecta blocks around Tycho crater, which formation age is known. We find that the evolution of lunar block size–frequency distribution in the range 1–50 m is as follow: For young (≤ 50 Myr) population, the size–frequency distribution is best approximated by a power law, whereas for older populations, the extrapolation at small diameters is best performed by an exponential distribution. New destruction rates are in better agreement with recent measurements [2,3] compared to the original model. For rocks above ~5 cm the survival time increases with increasing size, whereas for rocks below ~5 cm the survival time slightly increases with decreasing size. The updated model allows the estimation of both the exposure age and the initial abundance of a block field using the measurement of a block size–frequency distribution from LROC/NAC images.

References: [1] Hoerz et al., 1975, The Moon 13, 235–258. [2] Basilevsky et al., 2013, PSS, 89 (118–12). [3] Ghent et al., 2014, doi:10.1130/G35926.1.
Influence of pyrolysis temperature in the pore size distribution of biochar
Authors: Gascó Guerrero Gabriel , Saa-Requejo Antonio , Tarquis Ana M. , Martín-Sotoca Juan J. , Méndez Ana Maria
Published: March 2022

Biochar, the product of pyrolysis of biomass in the absence of oxygen, added to soil, has been explored in the last years to mitigate global warming. The biochar's nature could come from crop and tree residues, urban organic waste materials, and pig slurry, among others. A rising body of work quantifies the effect of pyrolysis conditions, mainly temperature, on chemical and physical biochar properties. One of these characteristics is porosity that is related with properties as water holding capacity. Besides quantifying the macro and micro-porosity, other parameters can be extracted from the pore size distribution (PSD). This work aims to extract scaling parameters from it to differentiate the biochar properties.

Biochars were prepared  from pig manure at three different pyrolysis temperatures: 300 (BPC-300), 450 (BPC-450) and 600ºC (BPC-600). Mercury injection porosimeter (MIP) was used to determine PSD of biochar for equivalent pore diameter from 1 mm to 0.005 mm. 

The multifractal formalism was employed to extract the scaling parameters. Mass exponent function and multifractal spectra showed that this method is suitable for mercury injection curves. The results show that with higher temperature applied in the pyrolysis process to obtain the biochar, the PSD multifractal characteristics decrease, pointing out a lower complexity in the PSD.
Stability and accuracy of Runge-Kutta-based split-explicit time-stepping algorithms for free-surface ocean models
Authors: Lemarie Florian , Ducousso Nicolas , Debreu Laurent , Madec Gurvan
Published: March 2022

Because of the Boussinesq assumption employed in the vast majority of oceanic models,
the acoustic waves are filtered and the fast dynamics corresponds to the external
gravity-wave propagation which is much faster than other (internal) processes.
The fast and slow dynamics are traditionally split into separate subproblems
where the fast motions are nearly independent of depth.  It is thus natural to
model these motions with a two-dimensional (barotropic) system of equations while
the slow processes are modeled with a three-dimensional (baroclinic) system.
However such splitting is inexact, the barotropic mode is not strictly depth-independent
meaning that the separation of slow and fast modes is non-orthogonal, even in the linear case.
A consequence is that there are some fast components contained in the slow motions which induce
instabilities controlled by time filtering of the fast mode.
In this talk we present an analysis of the stability and accuracy of the barotropic–baroclinic mode splitting
in the case where the baroclinic mode is integrated using a Runge-Kutta
scheme and the barotropic mode is integrated explicitly (i.e. the so-called split-explicit approach).
By referring to the theoretical framework developed by Demange et al. (2019),
the analysis is based on an eigenvector decomposition using the true
(depth-dependent) barotropic mode. We investigate several strategies to achieve stable
integrations whose performance is assessed first on a theoretical ground and then
by idealized linear and nonlinear numerical experiments.
Advancing transdisciplinary knowledge and procedures for mainstreaming WEFE Nexus: insights from the PRIMA NEXUS-NESS projects 
Authors: Nardi Fernando ,   NEXUS-NESS Project team
Published: March 2022

Science-informed models provided undoubtable indications of the crucial interlinkages that govern the Water, Energy, Food and Ecosystem (WEFE) dynamics. Managing natural and urban ecosystems without considering WEFE interlinkages may determine undesirable consequences in terms of safety and sustainability from multiple perspectives (e.g. environmental, social, economic). From short term operations to long term projections, science evidences depict the pivotal importance and multiple benefits of embracing WEFE Nexus approaches. Nevertheless, while science and technological advancements are pushing ahead such understanding, several technical and non-technical barriers still avoid the WEFE Nexus transition. WEFE-related Multi-Sector, Multi-Disciplinary and Multi-Actor cross-cooperation and mutual trust are still lacking in actual water and land management strategies. Moreover, stakeholders and citizens are not adequately informed and involved. WEFE Nexus policies are also generally missing.

The NEXUS Nature Ecosystem Society Solution or NEXUS-NESS project - funded by the PRIMA Programme under the 2020 Nexus Innovation Action - seeks to address this issue of paramount importance for the Mediterranean regions. NEXUS-NESS aims to co-produce and co-test with stakeholders WEFE Nexus management plans for fair and sustainable allocation of resources. At the same time a technological solution and tailored procedures are co-tested to provide actionable information and easy-to-follow guidelines for WEFE Nexus operators and stakeholders in selected case studies.

This contribution aims to specifically focus on the transdisciplinarity concept that was a guiding principle of the NEXUS-NESS project design and mission. The NEXUS-NESS solution transdisciplinary datasets and tools seek to interlink the WEF Nexus components with a three-fold conceptualization of the Ecosystem component (Environment, Economy, Engagement/Society). NEXUS-NESS will operationalize the adoption of a WEFE Nexus bottom-up approach in four different case studies employing Living Lab and Responsible Research And Innovation (RRI) principles. Results from the first year of project development are here illustrated with specific focus on the the Val di Cornia (Italy), Duero basin (Spain), Wadi Naghamish (Egypt) and Wadi Jir basin (Tunisia) Nexus Ecosystem Lab (NELs) initiation activities and feedbacks co-processed with local and regional stakeholders.
New modelling tools for quantification of mechanical reinforcement of soil by plant roots
Authors: Meijer Gerrit , Knappett Jonathan , Bengough Glyn , Muir Wood David , Liang Teng
Published: March 2022

Plant roots can help to stabilise riverbanks and slopes by providing additional mechanical reinforcement through tensioning of root material. This problem has typically been studied at the ultimate limit state, focussing on quantifying the peak root-reinforced soil strength. Existing models however rarely account for the gradual mobilisation of root-reinforcement associated with increasing soil displacements. Understanding these deformations is important when deformation tolerances are low, for example when constructing infrastructure embankments, or when deformations may serve as an early warning signal for slope failure.

Several new models to quantify mechanical reinforcement were developed, with varying levels of complexity. At the most basic level, fibre bundle model theory was combined with early pioneering work by Wu and Waldron to form a new fibre bundle approach that remains simple to use yet respects the physics of soil and root deformation. A second and more comprehensive analytical model was developed that can calculate reinforcements as a function of increasing soil shear displacement. This model includes key parameters such as the elasto-plastic biomechanical root behaviour, three-dimensional root orientations, root slippage and changes in the geometry of the localised shear zone in the soil. A third model comprises a full set of constitutive stress-strain relationships for rooted soil that can be used in numerical finite-element simulations. In this framework, the rooted soil is treated as a single, composite material in which the soil and root phase can each be assigned their own unique material behaviour. The composite approach simplifies model parameterisation by using independently measurable root and soil parameters, and is also powerful enough to investigate the complicated interaction between stresses and deformations in the soil skeleton and in the roots.

These models all provided good predictions of experimentally measured root reinforcements in direct shear tests. They will be useful tools both for the engineering industry, in terms of rapid quantification of root reinforcement, as well as for directing future research into the drivers of mechanical root-reinforcement.
Libera's Split-shortwave Measurements and Their Application in Climate Research
Authors: Hakuba Maria , Pilewskie Peter , Stephens Graeme , Science Team the Libera
Published: March 2022

With a few exceptions, spaceborne measurements of Earth’s top-of-atmosphere (TOA) outgoing reflected shortwave and emitted longwave radiation have been made over broad spectral bands covering the entirety of the solar spectral region, terrestrial infrared spectral region or the combination of both. Evidence suggests that separating the solar band into just two sub-bands, roughly equal in incoming solar irradiance levels but coincidently, where the atmosphere is nearly transparent to solar radiation in the visible (λ<700nm) and partially absorbing in the near-infrared sub-band (λ >700nm) primarily due to water vapor and clouds, provides great insight into the deposition of radiative energy in the atmosphere. Moreover, the two sub-bands also demarcate reflectance differences at the ground from different surface types such as vegetation, desert, ice and snow. Therefore, TOA reflected shortwave radiation in the two sub-bands are differently affected by changes in surface and atmospheric properties and support the characterization of processes relevant for shortwave absorption by the climate system, climate feedbacks, and Earth’s albedo variability with added insight into hemispheric albedo symmetry given the hemispheric differences in ocean, continent and cloud distributions. A new NASA Earth Radiation Budget mission, Libera, will directly measure the two sub-bands. We use UKESM1 simulations, Fu-Liou RTM calculations, SCIAMACHY reflectance and CLARREO OSSE output as proxies for Libera’s future data record to demonstrate applications of the shortwave sub-band knowledge in climate science.
Communicating risks: the problem of putting numbers into context
Authors: Dryhurst Sarah , Freeman Alexandra
Published: March 2022

Communicating a risk is far more than ‘getting a number across’ – it’s communicating likelihood and impact in such a way as to allow each member of the audience to make decisions based on their understanding of that risk. This means helping put that likelihood and impact into an appropriate context, and helping the audience weigh up in their mind the costs and benefits of different actions. In this presentation we will illustrate some of our work on communicating personalised risks from Covid-19 and Covid vaccinations, and how these findings might apply to the communication of seismic hazard and risk. For example, is it appropriate to compare the likelihood of someone dying from Covid-19 (if they catch it) with the likelihood of that same person dying from another cause? Our research suggests that people don’t find this as helpful as comparing their likelihood of dying from Covid-19 against the likelihoods of other people with different, familiar risk factors (such as older people, younger people, people with a pre-existing health condition etc). Does the same apply for seismic hazard and risk, such as operational earthquake forecasts? Would it help people to show the chances of their local area experiencing a seismic event compared to the chances in a range of other cities that they know (with high and low hazards)?  We will discuss the pros and cons of such an approach in communicating operational earthquake forecasts.