Search results for "010501 environmental sciences"
showing 10 items of 2754 documents
Radiance-based NIRv as a proxy for GPP of corn and soybean
2020
Abstract Substantial uncertainty exists in daily and sub-daily gross primary production (GPP) estimation, which dampens accurate monitoring of the global carbon cycle. Here we find that near-infrared radiance of vegetation (NIRv,Rad), defined as the product of observed NIR radiance and normalized difference vegetation index, can accurately estimate corn and soybean GPP at daily and half-hourly time scales, benchmarked with multi-year tower-based GPP at three sites with different environmental and irrigation conditions. Overall, NIRv,Rad explains 84% and 78% variations of half-hourly GPP for corn and soybean, respectively, outperforming NIR reflectance of vegetation (NIRv,Ref), enhanced vege…
Eco-Friendly Estimation of Heavy Metal Contents in Grapevine Foliage Using In-Field Hyperspectral Data and Multivariate Analysis
2019
Heavy metal monitoring in food-producing ecosystems can play an important role in human health safety. Since they are able to interfere with plants’ physiochemical characteristics, which influence the optical properties of leaves, they can be measured by in-field spectroscopy. In this study, the predictive power of spectroscopic data is examined. Five treatments of heavy metal stress (Cu, Zn, Pb, Cr, and Cd) were applied to grapevine seedlings and hyperspectral data (350−2500 nm), and heavy metal contents were collected based on in-field and laboratory experiments. The partial least squares (PLS) method was used as a feature selection technique, and multiple linear regressions (…
Transboundary Basins Need More Attention: Anthropogenic Impacts on Land Cover Changes in Aras River Basin, Monitoring and Prediction.
2020
Changes in land cover (LC) can alter the basin hydrology by affecting the evaporation, infiltration, and surface and subsurface flow processes, and ultimately affect river water quantity and quality. This study aimed to monitor and predict the LC composition of a major, transboundary basin contributing to the Caspian Sea, the Aras River Basin (ARB). To this end, four LC maps of ARB corresponding to the years 1984, 2000, 2010, and 2017 were generated using Landsat satellite imagery from Armenia and the Nakhchivan Autonomous Republic. The LC gains and losses, net changes, exchanges, and the spatial trend of changes over 33 years (1984–2017) were investigated. The most important drivers of the…
An assessment of the global impact of 21st century land use change on soil erosion
2017
Human activity and related land use change are the primary cause of accelerated soil erosion, which has substantial implications for nutrient and carbon cycling, land productivity and in turn, worldwide socio-economic conditions. Here we present an unprecedentedly high resolution (250 × 250 m) global potential soil erosion model, using a combination of remote sensing, GIS modelling and census data. We challenge the previous annual soil erosion reference values as our estimate, of 35.9 Pg yr−1 of soil eroded in 2012, is at least two times lower. Moreover, we estimate the spatial and temporal effects of land use change between 2001 and 2012 and the potential offset of the global application o…
Photoreduction of gaseous oxidized mercury changes global atmospheric mercury speciation, transport and deposition
2018
9 pags, 8 figs. -- Correction autor: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-022-28455-w http://hdl.handle.net/10261/268181
Occurrence, distribution, and risk assessment of pharmerciuticals in wastewater and open surface drains of peri-urban areas: Case study of Juja town,…
2020
Abstract The occurrence of Active Pharmaceutical Ingredients (APIs) in the environment is becoming a major area of concern due to their undesirable effects on non-target organisms. This study investigated the occurrence and risk of contamination by five antibiotics and three antiretrovirals drugs in a fast-growing peri-urban area in Kenya, with inadequate sewer system coverage. Due to poor sewage connectivity and poorly designed decentralized systems, wastewater is directly released in open drains. Water and sediment samples were collected from open surface water drains, while wastewater samples were collected from centralized wastewater treatment plants (WWTP). Solid-phase extraction and u…
A review of Payment for Ecosystem Services for the economic internalization of environmental externalities: A water perspective
2016
Abstract The allocation of economic value to environmental goods is intended to internalize the socio-economic and environmental costs of policies implemented and thus recognizes the value of the ecosystem and the consequences of environmental damage. This entails identifying the costs and benefits of management measures for conservation and of degraded ecosystems. The difficulties of this task are: (i) they are goods that have no market and (ii) there is a need for economic funding for conservation purposes. Payment for Ecosystem Services (PES) seeks to internalize the environmental externalities of human actions, ascribing monetary value to Ecosystem Services (ES) and helping decision-mak…
Integrated biomonitoring of airborne pollutants over space and time using tree rings, bark, leaves and epiphytic lichens
2016
The integrated use of tree rings and outer tissues, and lichens, was tested for monitoring how pollutant concentrations vary in space and over time nearby an incinerator in industrial area in Central Italy. Trace elements in thalli of lichen Xanthoria parietina and in leaves, bark, wood of Quercus pubescens, as well as carbon, oxygen and nitrogen isotope ratios in tree rings were analyzed. Some trace elements in the leaves differed significantly between the plots, though this was not the case in lichens and bark. The values of δ13C and δ18O showed the same trend in all plots, while the values of δ15N were higher in the distal plot. The results indicated that trace elements were intercepted …
The influence of the wind direction and plants on the variability of topsoil magnetic susceptibility in industrial and urban areas of southern Poland
2016
Volume magnetic susceptibility (κ) was measured on the soil surface and in the vertical topsoil profile within a 300 km2 area located in an urban-industrial conurbation. The results were compared to plant species compositions in the forest storeys, elevation above sea level, and terrain geomorphology. The content and mineral composition of the magnetic fraction were determined in the soil horizons. It was found that the extent of the area with enhanced topsoil magnetic susceptibility was similar to the dominant wind direction (south–west). Enhanced κ values were observed for the soil at the forest margin on the leeward side of the emitters as well as at sites located on exposed local elevat…
Coping with the impacts of Urban Heat Islands A literature based study on understanding urban heat vulnerability and the need for resilience in citie…
2018
The urban heat island (UHI) is a phenomenon whereby temperature levels in urban areas are higher than in surrounding rural settings. Urban heat islands are a matter of increasing concern, since they can affect communities by exacerbating air pollution and greenhouse gas emissions (due to the greater use of air conditioning) and the occurrence of heat-related illness, and may lead to higher levels of mortality. This paper provides a description of the phenomena of (UHI) and an analysis of how cities are vulnerable to it. It highlights the need for resilience and the variety of means by which the UHI can be tackled. It describes a set of trends in two regions in Germany and Australia, which i…