Short-Term and Long-Term Surface Soil Moisture Memory Time Scales Are Spatially Anticorrelated at Global Scales

McColl, Kaighin A.; He, Qing; Lu, Hui; Entekhabi, Dara

doi:10.1175/jhm-d-18-0141.1

Cited by 45 publications

(78 citation statements)

References 60 publications

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“…In contrast, ∆S in humid river basins is mostly controlled by changes in groundwater, followed by changes in soil moisture. These results are well supported by the literatures, since the response of groundwater fluxes to climate variability in arid regions is weaker than that in humid regions [Cuthbert et al, 2019], and the soil moisture memories (defined as the time taken to dissipate an anomaly) in humid regions are longer than those in arid regions [McColl et al, 2019]. Rahman et al [2015] also illustrates that the soil moisture memory timescale showed an exponential relationship with the basin aridity index, which is in line with our results that SM changes displayed an exponential relationship with the variable moisture conditions.…”

Section: Accepted Articlesupporting

confidence: 88%

Divergent Changes in Terrestrial Water Storage Across Global Arid and Humid Basins

Wang

et al. 2021

Geophysical Research Letters

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Terrestrial water storage (TWS), which includes ice and snow, lakes, rivers, soil water and groundwater, is a key parameter to close the water balance at global river basins (e.g., Liu et al., 2016). Moreover, the changes in TWS (∆S) and its components present considerable spatiotemporal heterogeneity at the global scale (Frappart & Ramillien, 2018). The traditional methods of estimating ∆S, including in situ observations and hydrological modeling, have their own limitations in different aspects. First, in situ observations are limited to the point scale and it is difficult to obtain ΔS observations in terrain with complicated topography (A. Wang & Zeng, 2012). Second, uncertainties in models and the lack of observation data in some areas will lead to large variations in the accuracy of model simulation results. Although microwave remote sensing could retrieve the TWS components, it is restricted to obtaining information about changes in soil moisture content only at depths up to 5 cm from the surface. The Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment (GRACE) twin satellite mission, jointly implemented by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), and German Aerospace Center, is primarily aimed at obtaining temporal variations in the Earth's gravity field with unprecedented accuracy (e.g., Save et al., 2016). GRACE not only effectively avoids the shortcomings of traditional methods, but also provides a new tool for directly monitoring large-scale ΔS. However, GRACE has its own limitations. In addition to the coarse spatial and temporal resolution of the raw data, it is difficult to trace

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Section: Accepted Articlesupporting

confidence: 88%

Divergent Changes in Terrestrial Water Storage Across Global Arid and Humid Basins

Wang

et al. 2021

Geophysical Research Letters

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“…(5) and (6) imply that anomalies in runoff and infiltration are generally large for a given P 0 . Higher runoff and infiltration fluxes in wet regions have been inferred from satellite observations of soil moisture (McColl et al 2019) and in soil chamber experiments dating back to the earliest examinations of flow through porous media (Richards 1928). In dry regions where s(P ) is generally small, Eqs.…”

Section: A Linear Response Surface Fluxesmentioning

confidence: 99%

A New Look at the Variance of Summertime Temperatures over Land

2020

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The increasing frequency of very high summertime temperatures has motivated growing interest in the processes determining the probability distribution of surface temperature over land. Here, we show that on monthly time scales, temperature anomalies can be modeled as linear responses to fluctuations in shortwave radiation and precipitation. Our model contains only three adjustable parameters, and, surprisingly, these can be taken as constant across the globe, notwithstanding large spatial variability in topography, vegetation, and hydrological processes. Using observations of shortwave radiation and precipitation from 2000 to 2017, the model accurately reproduces the observed pattern of temperature variance throughout the Northern Hemisphere midlatitudes. In addition, the variance in latent heat flux estimated by the model agrees well with the few long-term records that are available in the central United States. As an application of the model, we investigate the changes in the variance of monthly averaged surface temperature that might be expected due to anthropogenic climate change. We find that a climatic warming of 48C causes a 10% increase in temperature variance in parts of North America.

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“…Orth and Seneviratne (2013) used data from >100 catchments across Europe to study the impact of SWC memory (persistence characteristic) on ET a and runoff. Memory effects are typically studied using autocorrelation of observed or modeled SWC time series (McColl, He, Lu, & Entekhabi, 2019). Orth and Seneviratne (2013) found higher memory effects for monthly averaged data of SWC and ET than for daily averaged values, because the monthly aggregation takes out the daily variations of meteorological effects.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

On the impact of increasing drought on the relationship between soil water content and evapotranspiration of a grassland

Rahmati

Groh

Graf

et al. 2020

Vadose Zone Journal

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Weighable lysimeters were used to study the relation between soil water content (SWC) and the actual evapotranspiration (ET a) of grassland under two different climate regimes of Rollesbroich and Selhausen but for an identical soil from Rollesbroich. All components of the water balance were determined from 2012 until 2018. Budyko analysis was used to characterize the hydrological status of the studied sites. Wavelet analysis was also applied to study the power spectrum of ET a , vegetationheight-adjusted reference evapotranspiration (ET crop), and water stress index (WSI) defined as ET a /ET crop , as well as SWC at three different depths and the coherence between SWC and ET a and WSI. The Budyko analysis showed that 2018 resulted in a shift of both locations towards more water-limited conditions, although Rollesbroich remained an energy-limited system. Based on the power spectrum analysis, the annual timescale is the dominant scale for the temporal variability of ET a , ET crop , and SWC. The results also showed that increasing dryness at the energy-limited site led to more temporal variability of SWC at all depths at the annual timescale. Wavelet coherence analysis showed a reduction of the phase shift between SWC and ET a at an annual scale caused by the increase in dryness during the measurement period. We found that phase shifts between SWC and ET a and SWC and WSI were stronger at the water-limited site than at the energy-limited site. The wavelet coherence analysis also showed that from 2014 to 2018, the control of ET a and WSI on SWC increased due to higher dryness of soil.

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Short-Term and Long-Term Surface Soil Moisture Memory Time Scales Are Spatially Anticorrelated at Global Scales

Cited by 45 publications

References 60 publications

Divergent Changes in Terrestrial Water Storage Across Global Arid and Humid Basins

Divergent Changes in Terrestrial Water Storage Across Global Arid and Humid Basins

A New Look at the Variance of Summertime Temperatures over Land

On the impact of increasing drought on the relationship between soil water content and evapotranspiration of a grassland

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