New perspectives on interdisciplinary earth science at the Dead Sea: The DESERVE project

Abstract

The Dead Sea region has faced substantial environmental challenges in recent decades, including water resource scarcity, ~1m annual decreases in the water level, sinkhole development, ascending-brine freshwater pollution, and seismic disturbance risks. Natural processes are significantly affected by human interference as well as by climate change and tectonic developments over the long term. To get a deep understanding of processes and their interactions, innovative scientific approaches that integrate disciplinary research and education are required. The research project DESERVE (Helmholtz Virtual Institute Dead Sea Research Venue) addresses these challenges in an interdisciplinary approach that includes geophysics, hydrology, and meteorology. The project is implemented by a consortium of scientific institutions in neighboring countries of the Dead Sea (Israel, Jordan, Palestine Territories) and participating German Helmholtz Centres (KIT, GFZ, UFZ). A new monitoring network of meteorological, hydrological, and seismic/geodynamic stations has been established, and extensive field research and numerical simulations have been undertaken. For the first time, innovative measurement and modeling techniques have been applied to the extreme conditions of the Dead Sea and its surroundings. The preliminary results show the potential of these methods. First time ever performed eddy covariance measurements give insight into the governing factors of Dead Sea evaporation. High-resolution bathymetric investigations reveal a strong correlation between submarine springs and neo-tectonic patterns. Based on detailed studies of stratigraphy and borehole information, the extension of the subsurface drainage basin of the Dead Sea is now reliably estimated. Originality has been achieved in monitoring flash floods in an arid basin at its outlet and simultaneously in tributaries, supplemented by spatio-temporal rainfall data. Low-altitude, high resolution photogrammetry, allied to satellite image analysis and to geophysical surveys (e.g. shear-wave reflections) has enabled a more detailed characterization of sinkhole morphology and temporal development and the possible subsurface controls thereon. All the above listed efforts and scientific results take place with the interdisciplinary education of young scientists. They are invited to attend joint thematic workshops and winter schools as well as to participate in field experiments.

Spatial Non-Uniformity of Surface Temperature of the Dead Sea and Adjacent Land Areas

“…We thank the Satellite Application Facility on Climate Monitoring (CM SAF) team for Meteosat LST records [20]. The current study was carried out in the framework of the DESERVE (DEad SEa Research VEnue) project (https://www.deserve-vi.net/) aimed at studying coupled lithospheric, hydrological, and atmospheric processes in the Dead Sea region [31]. We thank the Editors (Jean-Francois Crétaux, Rodrigo Abarca Del Rio, and Claude Duguay) and all reviewers for their helpful comments.…”

Scale‐free distribution of Dead Sea sinkholes: Observations and modeling

“…Despite the many studies on the Dead Sea sinkholes [Atzori et al, 2015;Kottmeier et al, 2016], there are almost no studies regarding the size distribution of the sinkholes and their areal coverage's time development.…”

Dead Sea evaporation by eddy covariance measurements vs. aerodynamic, energy budget, Priestley–Taylor, and Penman estimates

“…In view of these environmental changes, resulting from the lake level decline, more accurate estimates of the Dead Sea evaporation are required (Kottmeier et al, 2016). Previous studies on the Dead Sea evaporation used indirect methods, such as water budget calculations (Salameh, 1996;Salameh and El-Naser, 2000); the energy budget approach (Stanhill, 1994;Lensky et al, 2005); aerodynamic methods (Salhotra et al, 1985;Oroud, 1994); or the combination of the latter two methods, called the combination approach (Calder and Neal, 1984;Asmar and Ergenzinger, 1999;Oroud, 2011).…”

“…However, to the authors' knowledge, no eddy covariance measurements were performed at the Dead Sea, where the environmental problems are severe. That is why, in the framework of the international DESERVE project (DEad SEa Research VEnue; Kottmeier et al, 2016), a new concept for assessing lake evaporation from onshore measurements was applied. Long-term eddy covariance measurements were conducted at the Dead Sea shore, which provided evaporation data of the water surface for onshore wind conditions.…”