In seasonally dry climates, a distinct rainy season is followed by a pronounced dry season during which rainfall often makes a negligible contribution to soil moisture. Using stochastic analytical models of soil moisture to represent the effects of this seasonal change has been hindered by the need to mathematically represent the stochastic influence of wet season climate on dry season soil wat...

RESEARCH DROUGHT-TOLERANT VARIETIES: Research on cassava’s water conserving properties and drought tolerance may lead to better varieties for farmers. USE FERTILIZER: Manure and synthetic fertilizer can improve soil fertility, but use must be integrated with other crops in the SHORT SHELF LIFE: Without proper storage or processing, cassava begins to deteriorate in as little as two to three days...

today, saving and storing water are among the most critical and important issues which have attracted the world's attention. history of storing water in the form of ghanat and water reservoir by iranians goes back to ancient times. studies on this field show that benefiting from underground dams was one of the methods employed for exploiting water in past times. in countries like iran, due...

Since 2000, NASA's Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectro-radiometer (MODIS) has provided 1×1 km estimates of 8-day gross primary production (GPP). The MODIS algorithm computes GPP as a simple function of absorbed photosynthetically active radiation and a regionally assigned light-use conversion efficiency (LUE) that is reduced if temperature or atmospheric vapor pressure deficits are suboptimal. ...

[i] Most measurement approaches for determining evaporation assume that the latent heat flux originates from the soil surface. Here, a new method is described for determining in situ soil water evaporation dynamics from fine-scale measurements of soil temperature and thermal properties with heat pulse sensors. A sensible heat balance is computed using soil heat flux density at two depths and ch...

An overview of the Geospatial Methodologies used in order to assess the Soil Erosion Risk by water. 1.2 The damages on Land are traduced in " Soil Erosion " , " Soil Degradation " and/or " Ecosystem Decline " .. Introduction The Soils constitute one of the most important of the world's natural resources. Life on earth is totally dependent on well management of soils (Agurgo, 1996). Into of the ...

Soil moisture gradients along hillslopes in humid watersheds, although indicated by vegetation gradients and by studies using models, have been difficult to confirm empirically. While soil properties and topographic features are the two general physiographic factors controlling soil moisture on hillslopes, studies have shown conflicting results regarding which factor is more important. The rela...

The causal agent of melioidosis, Burkholderia pseudomallei, has been cultured from paddy fields in the Lao PDR. We carried out a pilot study to examine the relationship between bacterial soil contamination and that of nearby surface waters in Saravane Province. Soil sampling was conducted at a depth of 30 cm (100 holes in a 45 × 45 m grid) at two sites, East and West Saravane. Moore's swabs wer...