this research was designed to evaluate and compare the applicability of two different types of irrigation including traditionally (surface irrigation) and simple sub-surface drip irrigation (using pricked-pipe covered with plastic cloth). two plots containing 39 pistachio trees with 720 m2 area were selected in rafsanjan, iran. both plots were irrigated using exactly the same quantity and quali...

Land cover is one of basic data layers in geographic information system for physical planning and environmentalmonitoring. Digital image classification is generally performed to produce land cover maps from remote sensing data,particularly for large areas. In the present study the multispectral image from IRS LISS-III image along with ancillary datasuch as vegetation indices, principal componen...

There are more than 750 counties in 13 provinces and autonomous regionsconstituting 30% of China lands which are facing serious problem of desertification. Theseareas are mainly distributed in arid, semi-arid and dry sub-humid areas in the western part ofNortheast China, North central china and most of northwest china. Biological methods are theultimate way for drift sand stabilization and a fu...

Agricultural drought, a common phenomenon in most parts of the world, is one of the most challenging natural hazards to monitor effectively. Land surface water index (LSWI), calculated as a normalized ratio between near infrared (NIR) and short-wave infrared (SWIR), is sensitive to vegetation and soil water content. This study examined the potential of a LSWI-based, drought-monitoring algorithm...

Above-ground cosmic-ray neutron measurements provide an opportunity to infer soil moisture at the subkilometer scale. Initial efforts to assimilate those measurements have shown promise. This study expands such analysis by investigating (1) how the information from aboveground cosmic-ray neutrons can constrain the soil moisture at distinct depths simulated by a land surface model, and (2) how c...

Soil loss is not limited to change from forest or woodland to other land uses/covers. It may occur when there is agricultural land-use/cover modification or conversion. Soil loss may influence loss of carbon from the soil, hence implication on greenhouse gas emission. Changing land use could be considered actually or potentially successful in adapting to climate change, or may be considered mal...

Based on the combined use of satellite remote sensing and geographical information systems(GIS), as well as field investigation, the land-use change dynamics and the interaction between these changes are analyzed in the Zuli River Basin located in semi-arid Loess Plateau China during the period of 1987-2005, which with typical farming-pastoral region feature of northern China. The land-use chan...

The Advanced Along-Track Scanning Radiometer (AATSR) land surface temperature (LST) product has a long-term time series of data from 20 May 2002 to 8 April 2012 and is a crucial dataset for global change studies. Accuracy and uncertainty assessment of satellite derived LST is important for its use in studying land–surface–atmosphere interactions. However, the validation of AATSR-derived LST pro...

The peri-urban area is the region where there is a more dynamic interaction between the urban and rural. The peri-urban area supplies natural resources, such as land for urban expansion and agricultural products to feed the urban population. In arid and semi-arid lands, such as northern Mexico, these areas may also be the source of water for the city's domestic demand. In addition, scholars arg...