## 3 Results and Discussion
### Climate Externalities and Their Role in Agroecosystem Intrusions
#### 3.1.3 Supporting Services  
Soil microbes and fertility are foundational supporting services critical to maintaining soil structure, nutrient cycling, and overall health within agroecosystems. These services strengthen agricultural productivity by enabling crop growth and sustaining soil ecosystems. However, climate extremes such as drought and flooding (or a combination of the two) threaten soil stability and fertility, especially in vulnerable regions like the Mediterranean basin, where steep slopes are particularly prone to erosion and degradation [71].  
* Soil Health  
Extreme temperature amplifies crops' vulnerability to diseases and pest infestation [72], while glooding-drying (FD) cycles disrupt soil by breaking down soil aggregates, exposing previously protected organic matter to microbial activity [73]. These cycles alter the soil's redox conditions, with significant implications for greenhouse gas emissions, specifically N\({}_{2}\)O, CH\({}_{4}\), and CO\({}_{2}\). Agricultural soils, which generally lack the interception capacity of forested soils, are particularly susceptible to saturation during these FD events, leading to a faster decrease in soil moisture [74]; researchers opined regarding the critical influence of FD conditions on crop viability on reducing the WHC (water holding capacity) of soil moisture content by 100% within ten days under FD conditions. For instance, [PERSON] et al. [75] indicated that a preceding drought can reduce the root growth in rice during subsequent flooding, an antagonistic effect also noted by [76], where prior drought intensifies flooding-induced photosynthetic inhibition. Studies by [PERSON] et al. [77] confirm simultaneous declines in carbon assimilation, stomatal conductance, and photosynthetic capacity under progressive soil drought.  
* Soil Moisture and Root Growth  
Extreme precipitation presents additional challenges to agroecosystems, leading to direct physical damage and complicating processes associated with excess moisture, such as flooding and waterlogging [78]. [PERSON] et al. [15] showed that continuous rainfall exceeding 5 mm daily causes flooding, resulting in high-level soil moisture that triggers a waterlogging disaster that severely affects sowing and damages the seedling emergence of winter wheat in China. The compounded effect of drought-flood events has severely disrupted the supporting systems within agroecosystems. Experimental studies by [PERSON] et al. [75] prove the complex interactions of drought and flooding, where DF events negatively impact root growth, yield components [79], photosynthesis [76], and endogenous hormone levels [80]. Also, increased drought lowers soil moisture content [81] and hinders seed germination, root development, and nutrient uptake [82]. These effects exhibit unique antagonistic dynamics rather than being merely cumulative. Also, severe drought in the initial stages of DF events exacerbated flood-induced root damage, significantly decreasing root activity indicators like bleeding intensity, root length, surface area, and volume--all vital for water uptake in rice.