Hydrological Basis and Discipline System of Cryohydrology: From a Perspective of Cryospheric Science

Abstract

Initially, cryohydrology was referred to as hydrology involving low temperatures, for example, the hydrological study of snow, ice, frozen ground, and cold water. This discipline broadened with the development of cryospheric science and now involves hydrological processes of various cryosphere elements systematically coupled with river basin hydrological processes. However, limited studies have introduced the characteristics and discipline connotations of cryohydrology from a perspective of cryospheric science. Here, we reviewed the evolution of the connotations of cryohydrology and analyzed its hydrological basis and discipline system. Three major conclusions were drawn. (1) Cryohydrology was developed based on traditional hydrology for a single element of the cryosphere and focuses on the hydrological functions of the cryosphere and its impact on the water cycle and water supply to other spheres. (2) The hydrological basis of cryohydrology can be summarized as water conservation, runoff recharge, and hydrological regulation. In detail, the water conservation function is primarily expressed as “source of freshwater” and “cold and wet islands,” the runoff recharge function is concerned with water supply, and the regulation function is effective at intra- and inter-annual scales. (3) The core research issues of cryohydrology are research methods, hydrological processes, watershed functions, and regional impact. The important characteristics of cryohydrology are frequent water phase transitions and high variability across spatial and temporal scales. Cryohydrology aims to deepen the understanding of the theoretical and cognitive levels of its mechanisms and processes, accurately quantify the hydrological functions of the basin, and promote understanding of the ecological and environmental impacts of the cryosphere.

Recent ground thermo-hydrological changes in a Tibetan endorheic catchment and implications for lake level changes

“…Altogether, these results highlight the dependance of key variables quantifying the catchment hydrological balance (evaporation, runoff) to the seasonal characteristics and interannual trends of the ground thermal regime (temperature, liquid vs frozen water content). Similarly to previous studies (Ding et al, 2020;Wang and Gao, 2022), these results advocate for the necessity to couple thermal and hydrological modeling to improve our ability to understand and quantify changes in the hydrological balance of high mountain catchments. To our best knowledge, our study represents to date the most complete effort to include the variety of coupled climatological, surface and subsurface processes characterizing the climate, hydrology and ground thermal regime of high-mountain catchments in Tibet at a small scale with a high spatial resolution.…”

Integrated Hydrologic Modelling of Groundwater-Surface Water Interactions in Cold Regions

“…Cold regions are headwaters of many prominent rivers around the world and considered as the water towers of inland river basins in arid/semi-arid regions (Yao et al, 2012;Qin et al, 2017;Immerzeel et al, 2020). As unique and critical elements of the terrestrial cryosphere, frozen soil and snow cover not only have significant influences on the hydrologic processes in cold regions (Ding et al, 2020;Wang et al, 2020;Gao et al, 2021a;McKenzie et al, 2021), but they are also extremely sensitive to seasonal (short-term, from day to month) and climate changes (longterm, from year to decade) (Kang et al, 2020;IPCC, 2019 SROCC). The pronounced global warming has led to permafrost degradation due to increased ground temperature, permafrost thawing, thickening of the active layer, shortening of the freezing period, and prolonged snowmelting period, which directly affect groundwater recharge, runoff, and promote groundwater-surface water (GW-SW) interactions (Nitze et al, 2018;Cheng et al, 2019;Teufel and Sushama, 2019;Zhao et al, 2019;Evans et al, 2020;Lemieux et al, 2020).…”

Diagnosing the impacts of permafrost on catchment hydrology: field measurements and model experiments in a mountainous catchment in western China

“…Permafrost covers 24% of the exposed land surface of the Northern Hemisphere (Zhang et al, 2005;Woo, 2012;Walwoord and Kurylyk, 2016). The high Asia region is largely covered by permafrost and is characterized by a fragile cold and arid ecosystem (Immerzeel et al, 2010;Ding et al, 2020). As this region serves as the "water tower" for nearly 1.4 billion people, understanding the permafrost hydrology is important for regional and downstream water resources management and ecosystem conservation.…”

“…Arctic and high mountain Asia, are undergoing rapid changes (Tananaev et al, 2020). Permafrost degradation and its impact on hydrology is one of the research frontiers Ding et al, 2020). The question "How will cold region runoff and groundwater change in a warmer climate (e.g.…”