An assessment of impacts of land-cover changes on root-zone soil moisture

Yin, Jifu; Zheng, Yu; Zhan, Xiwu; Hain, Christopher; Zhai, Qingfei; Duan, Changchun; Wu, Rongrong; Liu, Jicheng; Fang, Li

doi:10.1080/01431161.2015.1111539

Cited by 18 publications

(7 citation statements)

References 59 publications

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“…In addition, the soil water absorbed by plant roots is lost via transpirations through leaves by photosynthesis. Therefore, the large‐scale reforestation (new planting or changes from grassland) in the Loess Plateau during the past three decades have greatly increased the rainfall interception and evapotranspiration from the forests [ Sun et al ., ], which resulted in decreased root‐zone soil moisture and increased the likelihood of drought [ Yin et al ., ]. This is likely the main cause of the significant decreasing trend in regional soil moisture.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Detecting significant decreasing trends of land surface soil moisture in eastern China during the past three decades (1979–2010)

Chen

Liao

et al. 2016

JGR Atmospheres

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Understanding the historical trends and driving mechanism of China's soil moisture change is an important step in combating climate change. Using the time series satellite-derived Essential Climate Variable Soil Moisture (ECV_SM) product, we detected a significant decrease trend in land surface soil moisture in eastern China over a 32 year period . Theoretical sensitivity analysis suggested that soil moisture is regulated collectively by precipitation (P), potential evapotranspiration (PET), land surface conditions such as land cover/use changes, landscape features, irrigation and urban expansion, (m), and the water balance between input and output water supplies O (the input water supplies minus the output). The change in spatial pattern and temporal trend of P/PET is highly consistent with the corresponding change in soil moisture. The magnitude of soil moisture variation is also well correlated with that of P/PET (R 2 = 0.43; p < 0.001). Therefore, P/PET is believed to be the dominant factor in determining the temporal trends of soil moisture change. Among the 29 drainage basins with significant decreasing trend of soil moisture change, the areas of forest cover increased by 36.08% and the average topographic slope was twice steeper than that of other regions. Therefore, besides the climate factor (P/PET variable), land surface conditions (such as land cover changes and topographic) also played important roles in regulating the trend of regional soil moisture change. 1998;Uitdewilligen et al., 2003;Chen et al., 2012]. Due to its longer wavelength, the microwave can penetrate deeper into the media (i.e., soil and vegetation canopy) than the optical electromagnetic wave, and the CHEN ET AL.CHINA'S 32 YEAR SOIL MOISTURE 5177

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Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Detecting significant decreasing trends of land surface soil moisture in eastern China during the past three decades (1979–2010)

Chen

Liao

et al. 2016

JGR Atmospheres

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“…China covers a large area with complex terrain features (Yin et al ., ). The impacts of various geographical factors on precipitation therefore cause significant regional differences.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 97%

High‐resolution precipitation downscaling in mountainous areas over China: development and application of a statistical mapping approach

Zhu

Qiu

Zeng

et al. 2017

Intl Journal of Climatology

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High-resolution precipitation distributions in mountainous areas are important for hydrological and ecological assessments, especially in regions with few weather stations. In this study, we proposed an improved model for precipitation downscaling by adding two new parameters, i.e. the maximum precipitation increment direction and the prevailing precipitation direction, which represent the impacts of elevation and the sources of precipitation, respectively. The model parameterization is based on observations made at meteorological stations, terrain factors (e.g. elevation, aspect, and slope), and the new parameters. To evaluate the model, we used six sub-models, each of which considers different influencing factors, to estimate the precipitation distribution and compare their estimation errors. Based on the mean absolute error (MAE) and the root-mean-square error (RMSE) at the validation stations, we found that the sixth sub-model, which includes all the influencing factors, clearly ranks above the others in terms of precipitation downscaling. The monthly MAE and the RMSE of our downscaled precipitation range from 2.2 to 16.1 mm and from 3.4 to 22.7 mm, respectively, indicating more accurate estimation than the raw tropical precipitation measuring mission (TRMM) products (monthly MAE: 3.6-22.0 mm; monthly RMSE: 5.1-28.6%). Our results also show that the sixth sub-model performs better than the Auto-Searched Orographic and Atmospheric Effects Detrended Kriging model (ASOADeK model or Guan's model) due to the inclusion of the elevation and the sources of precipitation. Based on the sixth sub-model and the TRMM 3B43 products, we developed the monthly precipitation products in China from 2000 to 2007 at a spatial resolution of 1 km. Our improved approach to precipitation downscaling could be used for regions where the precipitation distribution is greatly affected by the terrain and few observations are available for estimating the precipitation distribution.

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“…The quality controlled 5 cm SCAN SM observations were then aggregated into daily averages. Station SM records with data coverage below 70% (510 days) over the May 3, 2017–April 30, 2019 period were also excluded (Yin et al, 2015). Finally, the SM observations from the 148 stations were used in this study.…”

Section: Datasetsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Near‐real‐time one‐kilometre Soil Moisture Active Passive soil moisture data product

Yin

Zhan

Liu³

et al. 2020

Hydrological Processes

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The coarse resolution soil moisture (SM) data from NASA SMAP mission have been steadily produced with the expected performance since April 2015. These coarse resolution observations could be downscaled to fine resolution using fine scale observations of SM sensitive quantities from existing satellite sensors. For operational users who need near‐real‐time (NRT) high resolution SM data, the downscaling approach should be feasible for operational implementation, requiring limited ancillary information and primarily depending on readily available satellite observations. Based on these principles, nine potential candidate downscaling schemes were selected for developing an optimal downscaling strategy. Using remotely sensed land surface temperature (LST) and enhanced vegetation index (EVI) observations, the optimal downscaling approach was tested for operational producing a NRT 1 km SM data product from SMAP. Comprehensive assessments on the 1 km SM product were conducted based on agreement statistics with in‐situ SM measurements. Statistical results show that the accuracy of the original coarse spatial resolution SMAP SM product can be significantly improved by 8% by the downscaled 1 km SM. With respect to the in‐situ measurements, the 1 km SM mapping capability developed here presents a clear advantage over the SMAP/Sentinel SM data product; and it also provides better data availability for users. This study suggests that a NRT 1 km SMAP SM data product could be routinely generated from SMAP at the centre for Satellite Applications and Research of NOAA NESDIS for operational users.

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An assessment of impacts of land-cover changes on root-zone soil moisture

Cited by 18 publications

References 59 publications

Detecting significant decreasing trends of land surface soil moisture in eastern China during the past three decades (1979–2010)

Detecting significant decreasing trends of land surface soil moisture in eastern China during the past three decades (1979–2010)

High‐resolution precipitation downscaling in mountainous areas over China: development and application of a statistical mapping approach

Near‐real‐time one‐kilometre Soil Moisture Active Passive soil moisture data product

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