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Measuring and modeling soil moisture and runoff at solar farms using a disconnected impervious surface approach Vadose Zone J. (IF 2.8) Pub Date : 2024-04-16 David Mulla, Jake Galzki, Aaron Hanson, Jirka Simunek
Ground‐mounted photovoltaic sites are often treated as impervious surfaces in stormwater permits. This ignores the pervious soils beneath and between solar arrays and leads to an overestimation of runoff. Our objective was to improve solar farm stormwater hydrology models by explicitly considering the disconnected impervious nature of solar design and site characteristics. Experimental sites established
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Mechanistically derived macroscopic root water uptake functions: The α and ω of root water uptake functions Vadose Zone J. (IF 2.8) Pub Date : 2024-04-12 Jan Vanderborght, Valentin Couvreur, Mathieu Javaux, Daniel Leitner, Andrea Schnepf, Harry Vereecken
Water uptake by plant roots is an important component of the soil water balance. Predicting to what extent potential transpiration from the canopy, that is, transpiration demand, can be met by supply of water from the soil through the root system is crucial to simulate the actual transpiration and assess vegetation water stress. In models that simulate the dynamics of vertical soil water content profiles
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Modeling water flow and volumetric water content in a degraded peat comparing unimodal with bimodal porosity and flux with pressure head boundary condition Vadose Zone J. (IF 2.8) Pub Date : 2024-04-12 Mariel F. Davies, Ottfried Dietrich, Horst H. Gerke, Christoph Merz
Degraded peatlands release large amounts of greenhouse gases. The development of effective mitigation and management measures requires an understanding of relevant site‐specific biogeochemical and hydraulic processes. However, the simulation of water fluxes and vadose zone state variables of degrading peatlands relies on proper process description, parameterization of hydraulic functions, and representation
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Unsaturated hydraulic property measurements of subtropical anthropogenic (purple) soils in China Vadose Zone J. (IF 2.8) Pub Date : 2024-04-12 Luwen Zhuang, Hao Chen, Ping Yan, Xingmei Liang, Wenceslau G. Teixera, Martinus Th. van Genuchten, Kairong Lin
Many anthropogenic soils, often referred to as red bed or purple soils, are distributed in various areas of southern China. Purple soils typically are highly weathered and often lead to natural and engineering hazards because of their relatively poor water retention properties. Knowledge of the unsaturated soil hydraulic properties of purple soils is crucial for their optimal management and various
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Vadose zone flushing of fertilizer tracked by isotopes of water and nitrate Vadose Zone J. (IF 2.8) Pub Date : 2024-04-09 Julie N. Weitzman, J. Renée Brooks, Jana E. Compton, Barton R. Faulkner, R. Edward Peachey, William D. Rugh, Robert A. Coulombe, Blake Hatteberg, Stephen R. Hutchins
A substantial fraction of nitrogen (N) fertilizer applied in agricultural systems is not incorporated into crops and moves below the rooting zone as nitrate (NO3−). Understanding mechanisms for soil N retention below the rooting zone and leaching to groundwater is essential for our ability to track the fate of added N. We used dual stable isotopes of nitrate (δ15N–NO3− and δ18O–NO3−) and water (δ18O–H2O
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Coupled hydro‐mechanical pore‐scale modeling of biopore‐coated clods for upscaling soil shrinkage and hydraulic properties Vadose Zone J. (IF 2.8) Pub Date : 2024-04-04 Luis Alfredo Pires Barbosa, Horst H. Gerke
Earthworms and plant roots are vital for macropore formation and stabilization. The organo‐mineral coating of biopore surfaces also regulates macropore‐matrix mass exchange during preferential flow. The influence of finer‐textured burrow coatings on macroscopic soil properties during shrinkage could potentially be assessed by upscaling pore‐scale hydraulic and mechanical simulations. The aim was to
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Implementation of the Brunswick model system into the Hydrus software suite Vadose Zone J. (IF 2.8) Pub Date : 2024-04-01 Efstathios Diamantopoulos, Jirka Simunek, Tobias K. D. Weber
The Brunswick modular framework for modeling unsaturated soil hydraulic properties (SHP) over the full moisture range was implemented in the Hydrus suite. Users can now additionally choose between four different variants of the Brunswick model: (i) van Genuchten–Mualem (VGM), (ii) Brooks–Corey, (iii) Kosugi, and (iv) modified van Genuchten. For demonstration purposes, simulation results for two different
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Averaging or adding domain conductivities to calculate the unsaturated soil hydraulic conductivity Vadose Zone J. (IF 2.8) Pub Date : 2024-03-28 Gerrit H. de Rooij
Recent models of the unsaturated hydraulic conductivity curve (UHCC) are the sum of separate UHCCs for domains of capillary water, film water, and water vapor. This requires parallel, noninteracting domains. A theoretical framework for aggregating domain conductivities to a bulk soil UHCC is presented to identify and possibly relax implicit assumptions about domain configuration. The paper develops
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Rien van Genuchten: A short autobiography Vadose Zone J. (IF 2.8) Pub Date : 2024-03-24 Martinus Th. van Genuchten
1 INTRODUCTION I am extremely honored to receive the 2023 Wolf Prize in the field of agriculture for “groundbreaking work in understanding water flow and predicting contaminant transport in soils,” and for that reason, being invited to contribute an autobiography to this special section of Vadose Zone Journal. Receiving the Wolf Prize reflects the guidance, support, and input I received from so many
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Downscaling SMAP soil moisture product in cold and arid region: Incorporating NDSI and BSI into the random forest algorithm Vadose Zone J. (IF 2.8) Pub Date : 2024-03-20 Mingxing Gao, Kui Zhu, Yanjun Guo, Xuhang Han, Dongsheng Li, Shujian Zhang
Soil moisture (SM) is a critical element of the hydrological cycle, land surface processes, and surface energy balance. However, the low spatial resolution of commonly used SM products limits the application of SM in agriculture and eco‐hydrology in cold and arid regions. In this study, the normalized difference soil index (NDSI) and bare soil index (BSI) were added to traditional downscaling factors
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Neutron imaging of exchange flow between biopore and matrix for Bt versus C horizons Vadose Zone J. (IF 2.8) Pub Date : 2024-03-20 Luis Alfredo Pires Barbosa, Fernando Vieira Lima, Horst H. Gerke
The surface coating of biopores plays a pivotal role in mediating mass exchange between the biopore and the soil matrix, ultimately governing preferential flow in structured soils. However, quantitative experiments of the flow exchange dynamics in the soil around an earthworm burrow (drilosphere) are limited. Here, we developed an experimental setup to mimic preferential flow within a biopore while
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Soil salinization in Portugal: An in‐depth exploration of impact, advancements, and future considerations Vadose Zone J. (IF 2.8) Pub Date : 2024-03-19 Tiago B. Ramos, Maria C. Gonçalves, Martinus Th. van Genuchten
Soil salinization poses a significant threat to agricultural production in Portugal. Collaborative research spanning three decades with the U.S. Salinity Laboratory in Riverside, California, has been instrumental in advancing our understanding of this issue. This study provides a concise overview of the causes of soil salinization in Portugal, focusing on ongoing efforts to comprehensively address
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Elucidating the role of water films on solute diffusion in unsaturated porous media by improved pore‐scale modeling Vadose Zone J. (IF 2.8) Pub Date : 2024-03-18 Yuankai Yang, Ravi A. Patel, Nikolaos I. Prasianakis, Sergey V. Churakov, Guido Deissmann, Dirk Bosbach
Solute diffusion in partially saturated porous media is an important fundamental process in many natural and environmental systems. At low water saturation, the solute transport is governed by the diffusion in thin water films on the surfaces of solids. In this study, we established an improved pore‐scale simulation framework successfully describing the solute diffusion in variably saturated porous
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Modeling N fertilization impact on water cycle and water use efficiency of maize, finger‐millet, and lablab crops in South India Vadose Zone J. (IF 2.8) Pub Date : 2024-03-16 Albara Almawazreh, Daniel Uteau, C. T. Subbarayappa, Andreas Buerkert, Sybille Lehmann, Stephan Peth
The understanding of the impact of nitrogen (N) fertilization on the field water cycle and corresponding water use efficiency (WUE) is very important for optimizing fertilization rates and conserving stressed water resources. We modeled soil moisture dynamics of maize (Zea mays L.), finger millet (Eleusine coracana Gaertn.), and lablab [Lablab purpureus (L..) Sweet] plots using calibrated HYDRUS‐1D
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Hydro‐pedo‐transfer‐functions expressing drought and memory effects on pine tree growth Vadose Zone J. (IF 2.8) Pub Date : 2024-03-02 Gerd Wessolek, Winfried Riek, Klaus Bohne
Over the last 30 years, the impact of climate change in Berlin, Germany, has manifested in the form of reduced summer rainfall, elevated temperatures, and a notable rise in the frequency of days with temperatures surpassing 30°C. All of them are leading to a decreasing water supply and increasing risk of drought. Various field, laboratory, and numerical simulation studies have been done for deriving
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The time validity of Philip's two‐term infiltration equation: An elusive theoretical quantity? Vadose Zone J. (IF 2.8) Pub Date : 2024-03-01 Jasper A. Vrugt, Jan W. Hopmans, Yifu Gao, Mehdi Rahmati, Jan Vanderborght, Harry Vereecken
The two‐term infiltration equation is commonly used to determine the sorptivity, , and product, , of the dimensionless multiple and saturated soil hydraulic conductivity from cumulative vertical infiltration measurements (L) at times (T). This reduced form of the quasi‐analytical power series solution of Richardson's equation of Philip enjoys a solid physical underpinning but at the expense of a limited
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Vadose zone perspectives in global arsenic research: A review and future opportunities Vadose Zone J. (IF 2.8) Pub Date : 2024-02-29 C. M. van Genuchten, K. Wang, R. Jakobsen
Few contaminants have been linked to more devastating human health and environmental impacts than carcinogenic arsenic (As). Geogenic As contamination of groundwater used as a drinking water source continues to threaten hundreds of millions of lives worldwide, with the As crisis in South and Southeast Asia often called “the largest mass poisoning in history.” In addition, anthropogenic As pollution
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Simulation of near-saturated flow in soil macropores with the lattice Boltzmann method Vadose Zone J. (IF 2.8) Pub Date : 2024-02-29 Jari Hyväluoma
Direct information about the soil structure can be obtained with X-ray computed microtomography, and the imaged macropore networks can be used as geometries in the lattice Boltzmann flow simulations. This method has not been widely applied for near-saturated flows due to methodological issues related to diffuse-interface two-phase flow simulations in samples with limited resolution. Here, a simple
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Microbial mediated carbon and nitrogen cycling in the spatially heterogeneous vadose zone: A modeling study Vadose Zone J. (IF 2.8) Pub Date : 2024-02-28 Swamini Khurana, Falk Heße, Anke Hildebrandt, Martin Thullner
Spatially distributed properties of the subsurface result in varying water saturation and preferential flow paths, which lead to heterogeneous solute transport patterns and heterogeneous microbial environments. This, in turn, influences the distribution of nutrients and energy gradients, microbial biomass, and activity thereof. By their very nature, current field sampling techniques do not resolve
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Disentangling slope‐scale spatial variability of saturated hydraulic conductivity in the black soil region of northeast China using noise‐assisted multivariate empirical mode decomposition Vadose Zone J. (IF 2.8) Pub Date : 2024-02-26 Yang Yang, Tingting Peng, Hui Zhang, Ole Wendroth, Zixin Jin, Xinyi Chen, Yingna Liu
Reliable estimates of saturated hydraulic conductivity (Ks) are usually difficult to obtain, as Ks is regulated by a variety of soil processes acting at different spatial scales that may obscure each other's impacts. We hypothesized that these scale‐specific relationships could be well characterized with the aid of the noise‐assisted multivariate empirical mode decomposition (NA‐MEMD), thereby serving
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Characterizing large‐scale preferential flow across Continental United States Vadose Zone J. (IF 2.8) Pub Date : 2024-02-25 Leah Kocian, Binayak P. Mohanty
Understanding preferential flow (PF) at large scales is critical for improving land management and groundwater (GW) quality. However, limited knowledge of this process, due to soil surface heterogeneity and observational constraints, hampers progress. In this study, we propose estimating effective PF at remote sensing footprint scale (4–9 km) by examining its impact on soil moisture (SM) distribution
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Transport, dispersion, and degradation of nonpoint source contaminants during flood-managed aquifer recharge Vadose Zone J. (IF 2.8) Pub Date : 2024-02-23 Zach Perzan, Kate Maher
In water-stressed regions of the world, the inundation of working landscapes to replenish aquifers—known as flood-managed aquifer recharge (flood-MAR)—has become a valuable tool for sustainable groundwater management. Due to their diverse land use histories, however, many potential recharge sites host nonpoint source contaminants (such as salts, pesticides, and fertilizers) within the vadose zone that
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Developments and applications of the HYDRUS computer software packages since 2016 Vadose Zone J. (IF 2.8) Pub Date : 2024-02-14 Jiří Šimůnek, Giuseppe Brunetti, Diederik Jacques, Martinus Th. van Genuchten, Miroslav Šejna
The HYDRUS codes have become standard tools for addressing many soil, agricultural, environmental, and hydrological problems requiring the evaluation of various subsurface physical, chemical, and biological processes. There are now many thousands of HYDRUS users worldwide, with thousands of applications of the HYDRUS models appearing in the peer-reviewed literature. In this manuscript, we provide an
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Exploring the artistic dimensions of soils in the vadose zone Vadose Zone J. (IF 2.8) Pub Date : 2024-02-14 Gerd Wessolek, Alexandra Toland
The rise of industrialized agriculture, coupled with a global demographic shift toward urbanization, has marginalized every-day connections between individuals and soils. This societal shift has led to a decline in the appreciation of and cultural identity with soils. Amid a broader movement aimed at fostering soil awareness and environmental action, many artists and designers have been instrumental
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Stochastic analysis of plant available water estimates and soil water balance components simulated by a hydrological model Vadose Zone J. (IF 2.8) Pub Date : 2024-02-09 Quirijn de Jong van Lier, Marina Luciana Abreu de Melo, Everton Alves Rodrigues Pinheiro
The uncertainty in soil hydraulic parameters is often not taken into account in process-based hydrological modeling. Performing runs with 104 stochastic parameter realizations, we evaluated the propagation of uncertainty in the Van Genuchten–Mualem (VGM) parameters into estimates of the threshold values of soil water content used to calculate the total and readily available water, and on the long-term
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The nature and extent of bomb tritium remaining in deep vadose zone: A synthesis and prognosis Vadose Zone J. (IF 2.8) Pub Date : 2024-01-19 Yanan Huang, Jaivime Evaristo, Zhi Li, Kwok P. Chun, Edwin H. Sutanudjaja, M. Bayani Cardenas, Marc F. P. Bierkens, James W. Kirchner, Martinus Th. van Genuchten
Tritium present in deep vadose zones is a useful tracer for estimating groundwater recharge, but its full utility is constrained by not knowing where and for how long the tritium tracing method remains applicable. We obtained 44 tritium profiles from 17 globally distributed sites with vadose zone thicknesses of 12–624 m and used transport models to estimate the number of years that tritium may still
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Validation of downscaled 1-km SMOS and SMAP soil moisture data in 2010–2021 Vadose Zone J. (IF 2.8) Pub Date : 2024-01-17 Bin Fang, Venkataraman Lakshmi, Runze Zhang
Soil moisture (SM) is an important component for many applications in agriculture, hydrology, meteorology, and ecology. In past decades, passive/active microwave sensors onboard Earth observation satellites are utilized to obtain SM estimates from radiometer or radar observations. In this study, the Soil Moisture and Ocean Salinity (SMOS) Level 3 daily SM retrievals at 25-km spatial resolution between
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Interpretation of large-scale, long-term electrical geophysical monitoring guided by a process simulation Vadose Zone J. (IF 2.8) Pub Date : 2024-01-16 Judith Robinson, Timothy Johnson, Jonathan Thomle, Joaquin Cambeiro, Kelsey Peta, Piyoosh Jaysaval, Rob Mackley
Surface electrical resistivity tomography (ERT) was used at a waste site to monitor vadose zone changes in electrical properties as a proxy for contaminant flux over a span of 17 years. The BC Cribs and Trenches (BCCT) site at the Hanford site contains 20 disposal trenches and six disposal cribs. Wastes include a large inventory of technetium-99 and large masses of nitrate and uranium-238. ERT data
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The osmotic potential of soil solutions in salt tolerance studies: Following M. Th. van Genuchten's innovation Vadose Zone J. (IF 2.8) Pub Date : 2024-01-09 Y. Pachepsky, A. Yakirevich, A. A. Ponizovsky, N. Gummatov
The osmotic potential in soil solutions decreases as salinity increases, and plants cannot take up enough soil water. Therefore, the osmotic potential of soil solutions can serve as an important metric of plant growth conditions in regions affected by soil salinization. Measurements of osmotic potential are labor and time consuming. This work aimed to determine more readily available soil salinity
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Temporal covariance of spatial soil moisture variations: A mechanistic error modeling approach Vadose Zone J. (IF 2.8) Pub Date : 2023-12-25 Marit G. A. Hendrickx, Jan Diels, Pieter Janssens, Steffen Schlüter, Jan Vanderborght
When estimating field-scale average soil moisture from sensors measuring at fixed positions, spatial variability in soil moisture leads to “measurement errors” of the spatial mean, which may persist over time due to persistent soil moisture patterns resulting in autocorrelated measurement errors. The uncertainty of parameters that are derived from such measurements may be underestimated when they are
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New insights into the correlation between soil thermal conductivity and water retention in unsaturated soils Vadose Zone J. (IF 2.8) Pub Date : 2023-12-25 Yongwei Fu, Behzad Ghanbarian, Robert Horton, Joshua Heitman
The heat transfer and water retention in soils, governed by soil thermal conductivity (λ) and soil water retention curve (SWRC), are coupled. Soil water content (θ) significantly affects λ. Several models have been developed to describe λ(θ) relationships for unsaturated soils. Ghanbarian and Daigle presented a percolation-based effective-medium approximation (P-EMA) for λ(θ) with two parameters: scaling
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Biochar modifies soil physical properties mostly through changes in soil structure rather than through its internal porosity Vadose Zone J. (IF 2.8) Pub Date : 2023-12-26 Martin Zanutel, Sarah Garré, Patrick Sanglier, Charles Bielders
Besides its carbon sequestration potential, biochar application generally improves soil physical properties, but the magnitude of its impact and the underlying mechanisms remain debated and depend on soil type, biochar application rate, and age. The objective was therefore to determine the effect of biochar application rate and age on physical properties of agricultural soils in a temperate climate
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Effects of improved water retention by increased soil organic matter on the water balance of arable soils: A numerical analysis Vadose Zone J. (IF 2.8) Pub Date : 2023-12-25 Mario Feifel, Wolfgang Durner, Tobias L. Hohenbrink, Andre Peters
Climate change will lead to prolonged droughts in various regions of the world, which may significantly affect agricultural production. This is particularly problematic for soils with low water retention capacity, which cannot store sufficient water for crops. In this paper, we investigate how a change in the water-holding capacity of the soil material, as could be achieved by increasing the soil organic
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Soil carbon determination for long-term monitoring revisited using thermo-gravimetric analysis Vadose Zone J. (IF 2.8) Pub Date : 2023-12-20 Inmaculada Lebron, David M. Cooper, Michele A. Brentegani, Laura A. Bentley, Gloria Dos Santos Pereira, Patrick Keenan, Jack Bernard Cosby, Bridget Emmet, David A. Robinson
Soils and the vadose zone are the major terrestrial repository of carbon (C) in the form of soil organic matter (SOM), more resistant black carbon (BC), and inorganic carbonate. Differentiating between these pools is important for assessing vulnerability to degradation and changes in the C cycle affecting soil health and climate regulation. Major monitoring programs from field to continent are now
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The value of soil temperature data versus soil moisture data for state, parameter, and flux estimation in unsaturated flow model Vadose Zone J. (IF 2.8) Pub Date : 2023-12-11 Rajsekhar Kandala, Harrie-Jan Hendricks Franssen, Abhijit Chaudhuri, M. Sekhar
This synthetic study explores the value of near-surface soil moisture and soil temperature measurements for the estimation of soil moisture and soil temperature profiles, soil hydraulic and thermal parameters, and latent heat and sensible heat fluxes using data assimilation (ensemble Kalman filter) in combination with unsaturated zone flow modeling (HYDRUS-1D), for 12 United States Department of Agriculture
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Importance of background threshold value development within risk-based corrective action programs Vadose Zone J. (IF 2.8) Pub Date : 2023-11-28 Kenneth S. Tramm, Jason T. Minter, Catherine A. Seaton
Risk-based corrective action (RBCA) programs employ conservative models to develop default values for soil screening, which simplify the risk assessment process. However, for several naturally occurring metals (e.g., arsenic and lead), these published screening values are often unrealistic and well below the documented background levels in soil. This can lead to confusion among the regulated community
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Linking horizontal crosshole GPR variability with root image information for maize crops Vadose Zone J. (IF 2.8) Pub Date : 2023-11-28 Lena Lärm, Felix Maximilian Bauer, Jan van der Kruk, Jan Vanderborght, Shehan Morandage, Harry Vereecken, Andrea Schnepf, Anja Klotzsche
Non-invasive imaging of processes within the soil–plant continuum, particularly root and soil water distributions, can help optimize agricultural practices such as irrigation and fertilization. In this study, in-situ time-lapse horizontal crosshole ground penetrating radar (GPR) measurements and root images were collected over three maize crop growing seasons at two minirhizotron facilities (Selhausen
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Improving evapotranspiration computation with electrical resistivity tomography in a maize field Vadose Zone J. (IF 2.8) Pub Date : 2023-11-28 Chunwei Chou, Luca Peruzzo, Nicola Falco, Zhao Hao, Benjamin Mary, Jiannan Wang, Yuxin Wu
Hydrogeophysical methods have been increasingly used to study subsurface soil–water dynamics, yet their application beyond the soil compartment or the quantitative link to soil hydraulic properties remains limited. To examine how these methods can inform model-based evapotranspiration (ET) calculation under varying soil water conditions, we conducted a pilot-scale field study at an experimental maize
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Application of cosmic-ray neutron probes for measuring soil moisture in rocky areas of the Taihang Mountains, North China Vadose Zone J. (IF 2.8) Pub Date : 2023-11-14 Zhihua Zhang, Huidi Ou, Yuefeng Shi, Youliang Ye, Yuqiang Sang, Siyi Zhang, Jinsong Zhang
The cosmic-ray neutron probe (CRNP) is a mesoscale and noninvasive method for measuring soil moisture and has been widely studied and applied. However, studies of its applicability in rocky mountainous areas are still challenging in complex topography and high gravel content. In this study, a field experiment was carried out to assess the applicability of the CRNP for measuring soil moisture in rocky
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Quantitative analysis of diurnal CO2 flux variations above an alkaline playa Vadose Zone J. (IF 2.8) Pub Date : 2023-11-09 Anne-Martine Doucet, Frances Jones, Katherine E. Raymond, Gregory Dipple, Thomas Andrew Black, Bethany Ladd, Klaus Ulrich Mayer
The alkaline playas at Atlin, BC, provide a unique opportunity for studying the carbonate–bicarbonate system and carbonate mineral stability at the Earth's surface. In this study, dynamic closed chambers (DCCs) and pore-gas sampling were used to directly quantify carbon dioxide (CO2) emission rates and characterize processes governing the CO2 exchange across the playa-atmosphere interface. Data were
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Heat transport from atmosphere through the subsurface to drinking-water supply pipes Vadose Zone J. (IF 2.8) Pub Date : 2023-11-09 Elisabeth Nissler, Samuel Scherrer, Holger Class, Tanja Müller, Mark Hermannspan, Esad Osmancevic, Claus Haslauer
Drinking-water quality in supply pipe networks can be negatively affected by high temperatures during hot summer months due to detrimental bacteria encountering ideal conditions for growth. Thus, water suppliers are interested in estimating the temperature in their distribution networks. We investigate both experimentally and by numerical simulation the heat and water transport from ground surface
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Mapping spatiotemporal soil moisture in highly heterogeneous agricultural landscapes using mobile dual-spectra cosmic-ray neutron sensing Vadose Zone J. (IF 2.8) Pub Date : 2023-10-31 Mie Andreasen, Søren Julsgaard Kragh, Rena Meyer, Karsten Høgh Jensen, Majken C. Looms
Accurate large-scale soil moisture (SM) maps are crucial for catchment-scale hydrological models used for water resource management and warning systems for droughts, floods, and wildfires. SM can be mapped by mobile cosmic-ray neutron (CRN) systems of moderated detectors at homogeneous landscapes of similar soil and vegetation. In this study, we present a new approach for mobile CRN detection to perform
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Estimation of soil moisture using environmental covariates and machine learning algorithms in Cathedral Peak Catchment, South Africa Vadose Zone J. (IF 2.8) Pub Date : 2023-10-25 Daniel Murungi Kironde Kibirige, Shaeden Gokool, Zama Nosihle Mkhize
Soil moisture (SM) is a fundamental constituent of the terrestrial environment and the hydrological cycle. Owing to its significant influence on catchment hydrological responses, it can be utilized as an indicator of floods and droughts to aid early warning systems. This study aimed to develop a field-scale method to estimate SM using parametric and machine learning-based methods to compare whether
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A numerical test of soil layering effects on theoretical and practical Beerkan infiltration runs Vadose Zone J. (IF 2.8) Pub Date : 2023-10-19 Vincenzo Bagarello, Massimo Iovino, Jianbin Lai
With reference to a more compacted and less conductive upper soil layer overlying a less compacted and more conductive subsoil, a simple three-dimensional (3D) infiltration run is expected to yield more representative results of the upper layer than the subsoil. However, there is the need to quantitatively establish what is meant by more representativeness. At this aim, numerically simulated infiltration
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Insights into tension-mediated and antecedent water effects on soil water isotopic composition Vadose Zone J. (IF 2.8) Pub Date : 2023-10-19 Paulina Deseano Diaz, Thai Nong, Nicolas Brüggemann, Maren Dubbert, Mathieu Javaux, Natalie Orlowski, Harry Vereecken, Youri Rothfuss
Using isotopic spike experiments, we investigated the existence and magnitude of soil-mediated isotopic effects and of the interaction between isotopically distinct soil water pools, both associated in isotopic mismatches between water extracted from soil and soil water taken up by the roots. For this, we applied and compared four established techniques commonly used for the extraction of water (vapor)
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Water partitioning and migration in unsaturated bentonites by low-field NMR characterization Vadose Zone J. (IF 2.8) Pub Date : 2023-10-16 Ling Peng, Fan Zhang, Yi Dong, Chi Zhang
Water behavior in bentonite clay pores is influenced by soil–water interaction mechanisms such as capillary and adsorptive forces. Quantitative measurement of these water statuses remains challenging, leading to the adoption of advanced techniques. This study uses low-field nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) technique to investigate water partitioning dynamics and changes in the water state in sodium-rich
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Quantification of red soil macropores affected by slope erosion and sediment using computed tomography Vadose Zone J. (IF 2.8) Pub Date : 2023-10-16 Si-Yi Zhang, Bin He, Beibei Hao, Depeng Lv
Soil structure is an important factor interacting with soil erosion and sediment processes. However, few studies have focused on the relationship between soil macroporosity and soil erosion across different terrains. The aim of this study was to quantify and compare soil properties and macroporosity characteristics in collapsing gully areas and to explore their impact on the formation and development
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Water vapor transport through bioenergy grass residues and its effects on soil water evaporation Vadose Zone J. (IF 2.8) Pub Date : 2023-10-12 Henrique D. R. Carvalho, Adam M. Howard, Aziz Amoozegar, Carl R. Crozier, Amy M. Johnson, Joshua L. Heitman
Miscanthus is a productive perennial grass that is suitable as a bioenergy crop in “marginal” lands (e.g., eroded soils) with low water holding capacity. However, little is known about the impact of miscanthus residues on vapor transport and soil water budgets. Laboratory experiments were conducted to measure the vapor conductance through miscanthus residues and its effect on soil water evaporation
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Contactless estimation of soil moisture using leaky Rayleigh waves and a fully convolutional network Vadose Zone J. (IF 2.8) Pub Date : 2023-10-12 Seoungmin Lee, Dong Kook Woo, Hajin Choi
Soil moisture is a key factor that influences various aspects of ecosystem functioning. Measuring soil moisture without installing any objects in the soil is desirable because it allows for accurate characterizations of soil moisture while minimizing impacts on soil structure and ecology. In this study, we explored the potential of leaky Rayleigh waves as a proxy to contactlessly estimate soil moisture
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Validating coupled flow theory for bare-soil evaporation under different boundary conditions Vadose Zone J. (IF 2.8) Pub Date : 2023-10-04 Johanna R. Blöcher, Efstathios Diamantopoulos, Wolfgang Durner, Sascha C. Iden
Evaporation from bare soil is an important hydrological process and part of the water and energy balance of terrestrial systems. Modeling bare-soil evaporation is challenging, mainly due to nonlinear couplings among liquid water, water vapor, and heat fluxes. Model concepts of varying complexity have been proposed for predicting evaporative water and energy fluxes. Our aim was to test a standard model
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Examining the value of hydropedological information on hydrological modeling at different scales in the Sabie catchment, South Africa Vadose Zone J. (IF 2.8) Pub Date : 2023-09-26 Edward Smit, George van Zijl, Eddie Riddell, Johan van Tol
Detailed soil information is increasingly sought after for watershed-scale hydrological modeling to better understand the soil–water interactions at a landscape level. In South Africa, 8% of the surface area is responsible for 50% of the mean annual runoff. Thus, understanding the soil–water dynamics in these catchments remains imperative to future water resource management. In this study, the value
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Issue Information Vadose Zone J. (IF 2.8) Pub Date : 2023-09-12
On the cover: Inside of these nodules, microbes are harnessing an element that we all need for life! Rhizobia partner with legumes to convert atmospheric nitrogen into an organic form; this symbiotic process has been a key mechanism behind soil fertility for millennia. Photo credit: Vivian Wauters.
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Modified expression for hydraulic conductivity according to Mualem–van Genuchten to allow proper computations at low-pressure heads Vadose Zone J. (IF 2.8) Pub Date : 2023-09-07 Marius Heinen
Water retention and hydraulic conductivity characteristics are key input data in studies on soil water dynamics in the vadose zone. The most well-known analytical functions to describe these characteristics are those given by Mualem and van Genuchten, where van Genuchten showed that both can be described by a limited set of shared parameters. Analytically, there are no restrictions on the range of
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Seasonality and evaporation of water resources in Reynolds Creek Experimental Watershed and Critical Zone Observatory, Southwestern Idaho, USA Vadose Zone J. (IF 2.8) Pub Date : 2023-08-31 Melissa E. Schlegel, Jennifer Souza, Sara R. Warix, Ruth MacNeille, Erin Murray, Anna Radke, Sarah E. Godsey, Mark S. Seyfried, Bruce Finney, Gerald Flerchinger, Kathleen A. Lohse
The Reynolds Creek Experimental Watershed (RCEW) and Critical Zone Observatory (CZO), located south of the western Snake River Plain in the Intermountain West of the United States, is the site of over 60 years of research aimed at understanding integrated earth processes in a semi-arid climate to aid sustainable use of environmental resources. Meteoric water lines (MWLs) are used to interpret hydrologic
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Coupling non-invasive imaging and reactive transport modeling to investigate water and oxygen dynamics in the root zone Vadose Zone J. (IF 2.8) Pub Date : 2023-08-10 Sarah Bereswill, Hannah Gatz-Miller, Danyang Su, Christian Tötzke, Nikolay Kardjilov, Sascha E. Oswald, Klaus Ulrich Mayer
Oxygen (O2) availability in soils is vital for plant growth and productivity. The transport and consumption of O2 in the root zone is closely linked to soil moisture content, the spatial distribution of roots, as well as structure and heterogeneity of the surrounding soil. In this study, we measure three-dimensional root system architecture and the spatiotemporal dynamics of soil moisture (θ) and O2
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Fate of herbicides in cropped lysimeters: 2. Leaching of four maize herbicides considering different processes Vadose Zone J. (IF 2.8) Pub Date : 2023-08-04 Anne Imig, Lea Augustin, Jannis Groh, Thomas Pütz, Martin Elsner, Florian Einsiedl, Arno Rein
This study investigates the contamination potential of herbicides to groundwater with the help of numerical modeling (HYDRUS-1D) and stable carbon isotopes for characterizing biodegradation. Four herbicides, metolachlor, terbuthylazine, prosulfuron, and nicosulfuron, were applied over a period of 4.5 years on two lysimeters located in Wielenbach, Germany, and monitored by lysimeter drainage. These
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Combining root and soil hydraulics in macroscopic representations of root water uptake Vadose Zone J. (IF 2.8) Pub Date : 2023-07-31 Jan Vanderborght, Daniel Leitner, Andrea Schnepf, Valentin Couvreur, Harry Vereecken, Mathieu Javaux
Plant water uptake and plant and soil water status are important for the soil water balance and plant growth. They depend on atmospheric water demand and the accessibility of soil water to plant roots, which is in turn related to the hydraulic properties of the root system and the soil around root segments. We present a simulation model that describes water flow in the soil–plant system mechanistically