Soil Moisture Rather than Soil Nutrient Regulates the Belowground Bud Bank of Rhizomatous Species Psammochloa villosa in Arid Sand Dunes

Investigating the interaction between rivers and sand dunes in arid and semi-arid regions of Iran

Extended abstract 1- Introduction Fluvial and aeolian processes are important factors in changing the surface of morphology in the Earth. When rivers and sand dunes meet, the transportation of sediment  between them can lead to one of the systems or both  of them change. With their connection between river sediment and wind systems there would be lots of reactions, but very little has been st...

Soil Moisture Measurements by Synthetic Aperture Radar and Scatterometers in the Arid and Semi-arid Environment

Water is a scarce commodity in desert regions; yet, most remote sensing experiments of soil moisture have been conducted in temperate areas. The ability to detect and reliably assess soil moisture in the arid environment has important implications both at the micro scale such as the individual farm and at the macro scale for climate modeling. A series of experiments utilizing an airborne scatte...

Soil and Belowground Processes

Soil characteristics and functions are critical determinants of rangeland systems and the ecosystem services that they provide. Rangeland soils are extremely diverse, but an emerging understanding is that paradigms developed in more mesic forest ecosystems may not be applicable. Vascular plants, biological soil crusts, and the soil microbial community are the three major functional groups of or...

Controls on Patterns of Soil Moisture in Arid and Semi-arid Systems

Plant Responses to an Edaphic Gradient across an Active Sand Dune/desert Boundary in the Great Basin Desert

In arid ecosystems, variation in precipitation causes broad-scale spatial heterogeneity in soil moisture, but differences in soil texture, development, and plant cover can also create substantial local soil moisture heterogeneity. The boundary between inland desert sand dunes and adjacent desert habitats exhibits abrupt changes in soil and vegetation characteristics that may be associated with ...