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Mineral dust is among the top contributors to global aerosol loads. Ability of non‐photosynthetic vegetation (NPV) to suppress dust emission has been widely acknowledged but a realistic representation of NPV has not been tested with regional‐to‐global scale models. In this study, we implemented a satellite‐based total vegetation data set, which included NPV, into a regional atmospheric chemistry model and conducted simulations for the year 2016 over the conterminous United States. To test the response of dust simulations to the NPV coverage, we conducted a control simulation incorporating only the photosynthetic vegetation (PV). Simulated dust emissions decrease by 10%–70% over most of the southwestern US from spring to autumn due to NPV. Reductions in dust concentrations are the largest in spring, which attenuate the overpredictions of fine soil concentrations, but accentuate the underpredictions in summer. Overall, the mean errors and correlations of annual simulations are slightly improved with NPV. NPV modulates dust emissions mainly by sheltering the surface and increasing the threshold velocity through drag partitioning. Moreover, we investigated the effect of vegetation height and addressed its uncertainties through a series of sensitivity tests. We observed that a 50% variation in predefined vegetation heights results in small changes in soil concentrations over majority of southwestern US, but causes up to 30% changes at local hotspots. This study highlights the significance of including NPV into the dust model and points out the importance of validation of total vegetation datasets as well as more realistic representation of vegetation heights and seasonality.

Nowadays, the increasing Dolichospermum (Anabaena) blooms pose a major threat to the aquatic environment and public health worldwide. The use of naturally derived chemicals from plants to control cyanobacteria blooms has recently received a tremendous amount of attention. This study investigates the possibility of transforming watermelon peel (WMP) into a biological resource to allelopathically inhibit Dolichospermum flos-aquae blooms. The results demonstrated that the growth of D. flos-aquae was efficiently restricted by the aqueous extract of watermelon peel (WMPAE) in a concentration-dependent manner. Cell viability decreased quickly, intracellular structural damage occurred, chlorophyll a in algal cells degraded, and photosynthesis was clearly inhibited. At the same time, the levels of reactive oxygen species in viable cells increased significantly, as did malondialdehyde levels, indicating that WMPAE elucidated strong oxidative stress and corresponding damage to D. flos-aquae. Capsular polysaccharide (CPS) levels increased in all treatment groups, which represents an adaptive response indicative of the development of resistance to WMPAE stress and oxidative damage. Despite this, WMPAE had clear inhibitory effects on D. flos-aquae. These findings provide fundamental information on an allelopathic system that could be a novel and attractive approach for suppressing D. flos-aquae blooms in small aquatic environments, especially aquaculture ponds.