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The coupling between modern electric power physical and cyber systems is deepening. An increasing number of users are gradually participating in power operation and control, engaging in bidirectional interactions with the grid. The evolving new power system is transforming into a highly intelligent socio–cyber–physical system, featuring increasingly intricate and expansive architectures. Demands for stable system operation are becoming more specific and rigorous. The new power system confronts significant challenges in areas like planning, dispatching, and operational maintenance. Hence, this paper aims to comprehensively explore potential synergies among various power system components from multiple viewpoints. It analyzes numerous core elements and key technologies to fully unlock the efficiency of this coupling. Our objective is to establish a solid theoretical foundation and practical strategies for the precise implementation of integrated planning and operation dispatching of source–grid–load–storage systems. Based on this, the paper first delves into the theoretical concepts of source, grid, load, and storage, comprehensively exploring new developments and emerging changes in each domain within the new power system context. Secondly, it summarizes pivotal technologies such as data acquisition, collaborative planning, and security measures, while presenting reasonable prospects for their future advancement. Finally, the paper extensively discusses the immense value and potential applications of the integrated planning and operation dispatching concept in source–grid–load–storage systems. This includes its assistance in regards to large-scale engineering projects such as extreme disaster management, facilitating green energy development in desertification regions, and promoting the construction of zero-carbon parks. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Soil microbial communities, which play a key role in the provision of essential ecosystem services, are significantly influenced by several physical and chemical soil properties that may change with land management. This study explores the effect of different land cover types (coniferous tree stands, broad-leaved stands, shrublands, pastures/grasslands and croplands) on physical, chemical and microbial properties (all contributing to soil health) in southern European areas under moderate-high desertification risk selected in Italy, Spain and Portugal. In sites that differ in land cover, we determined microbial biomass (C mic), activity and indices of microbial metabolism including C mic /C org ratio, metabolic quotient (qCO 2) and quotient of mineralization (qM). Soil physical and chemical properties were also measured, comprising bulk density (BD), water content (WC), pH, cation exchange capacity (CEC), total organic C (C org) and some of its labile fractions, extractable C (C ext) and mineralizable C (C min), total N content and C/N. Results showed that land cover type played a strong role in determining magnitude of microbial variables with biomass and activity being higher under coniferous tree cover than in other land covers, according to trends in WC, CEC, C org , C ext , C min , N, C/N. Compared to land cover, aridity index had lower effect on investigated variables. In comparison to sites with higher C org content, sites with lower C org content (most croplands) tended to lose C more rapidly, as suggested by high qM values, except for Spanish acidic soils. Therefore, urgent actions must be taken to counteract the tendency of C-poorer soils to lose C, promoting land cover types that facilitate soil recovery by ensuring denser and more continuous soil cover over time. We also identified a minimum set of soil variables that provide information on soil health changes in both short term (microbial variables) and longer term (physical and chemical variables) in areas under desertification risk. [Display omitted] • Land cover is a key factor affecting soil health in areas at desertification risk. • Coniferous cover had the best effect on soil microbial, physical and chemical variables. • Croplands, grasslands, shrublands and broad-leaved soils differed at a lesser extent. • Soils poorer in organic C tended to lose C more rapidly than richer soils. • A minimum data set of soil health indicators was proposed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A new technique was introduced for sand stabilization and re-vegetation by use of lignin sand stabilizing material (LSSM). LSSM is a reconstructed organic compound with lignin as the most dominant component from the extracts of black-liquor issued by straw pulp paper mills. Unlike the polyvinyl acetate or foamed asphalt commonly used for dune stabilization, the new material is plant-friendly and can be used with virescence actions simultaneously. The field experimental study was conducted since 2001 in China's Northwest Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region and has been proved that LSSM is effective in stabilizing the fugitive dunes, making the arenaceous plants survive and the bare dune vegetative. The advisable solution concentration is 2% and the optimal field spraying quantity is 2.5 L/m^2. The soil nutrients of the stabilized and greened dune, such as organic matter, available phosphorous and total nitrogen are all increased compared with the control treatment, which is certainly helpful to the growth of arenaceous plants. The technique is worthwhile to be popularized because it is provided not only a new method for desertification control but also an outlet for cleaning contaminants issued from the straw paper mills. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The predictions and warnings from drying up lakes and rivers are increasing nowadays, especially in Iraq, due to climatic changes and water flow reduction from neighboring countries. Consequently, this paper deals with monitoring the changes in submerged surface areas and Hamrin dam lake storage volume from December 2011 to the end of 2022. Hamrin Lake supplies Diyala province, Iraq, with irrigation water. Multitemporal satellite images were acquired from google earth pro and Earth Observation (EO) browsers. Triangular Irregular Network (TIN) layers generated contour lines through the ArcGIS environment. Volumes were calculated using the end area method. The results show that the water storage volume reached 1.8 billion cubic meters (bcm) in December 2016 and decreased to 12 million cubic meters in December 2021. Hamrin Lake lost 99% and 98% of its capacity relative to the normal water storage volume in 2021 and 2022, respectively. At normal storage, the maximum water volume of Hamrin Lake is about 3 bcm. The scarcity of irrigation water from Hamrin Lake causes decreasing agricultural areas, desertification, and people migrating to other regions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Desertification is the deterioration of land brought on by human activity, climate change, and a loss of vegetation cover and biodiversity. This paper assesses the agricultural drought and desertification levels of Khanaqin district in Diyala province, Iraq, using Sentinel-2 images with a high resolution of 10 m between July 22, 2016, and July 22, 2022. The Modified Soil-Adjusted Vegetation Index (MSAVI2), Topsoil Grain Size Index (TGSI), and Salinity Index (SI) derived from Sentinel-2 satellite images were used for this aim. The result showed that the area covered by low desertification intensity increased from (12.05%-9.41%) for the years (2016-2022). The area covered by high desertification intensity increased from (32.49-36.44% for the years (2016-2022), indicating an accelerated desertification process. Finally, the area covered by high desertification intensity increased from 12.34%-21.23% for years (2016-2022). Natural climate variability and human activities, such as land use, overgrazing, deforestation, and unsustainable farming practices, cause agricultural drought and desertification. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In order to stop and reverse land degradation and curb the loss of biodiversity, the United Nations 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development proposes to combat desertification. In this paper, a fractional vegetation–water model in an arid flat environment is studied. The pattern behavior of the fractional model is much more complex than that of the integer order. We study the stability and Turing instability of the system, as well as the Hopf bifurcation of fractional order α , and obtain the Turing region in the parameter space. According to the amplitude equation, different types of stationary mode discoveries can be obtained, including point patterns and strip patterns. Finally, the results of the numerical simulation and theoretical analysis are consistent. We find some novel fractal patterns of the fractional vegetation–water model in an arid flat environment. When the diffusion coefficient, d, changes and other parameters remain unchanged, the pattern structure changes from stripes to spots. When the fractional order parameter, β , changes, and other parameters remain unchanged, the pattern structure becomes more stable and is not easy to destroy. The research results can provide new ideas for the prevention and control of desertification vegetation patterns. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, managed forest ( MF) and natural forest ( NF) in the Huajiang Demonstration Zone of Guanling, Guizhou were selected as research objects, and cropland ( CL) was taken as control. High-throughput sequencing technology was used to study the characteristics of fungal community composition and species diversity in the surface ( 0 - 10 cm) soil of each restoration measure, in order to reveal the dominant soil fungal groups and fungal community composition in karst rocky desertification areas, which was conducive to a more comprehensive understanding of the soil conditions of different vegetation restoration measures. Research has shown that vegetation restoration significantly affected the diversity of soil fungal community, with significant increases in Sob index, Ace index, and Chao index. The vegetation restoration has significantly changed the composition of fungal community. The dominant fungi in the CL topsoil are Sordariomycetes (62. 28%), Dothideomycetes (12. 34%), and Eurotiomycetes (9. 12%); the dominant fungi in the MF soil are Sordariomycetes ( 45. 05%), Dothideomycetes ( 14. 74%), and Mortierellomycetes ( 10. 40%) ; the dominant fungi in the NF soil are unclassified fungal community (26. 38%), Sordariomycetes ( 19. 78%), and Agaricomycetes ( 13. 82%). Vegetation restoration has changed the key fungal groups in the soil. Sordariomycetes, Fwarium, and Setophoma are the key dominant fungal groups in CL soil; Dioszegia is key dominant fungal group in MF soil; c_unclassified_k_Fungi, p_unclassified_k_Fungi, o_unclassified_k_Fungi, f_unclassified_k_Fungi, g_unclassified_k_Fungi, Teichospora, and Diaporthe are key dominant fungal groups in NF soil. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper is devoted to a mathematical model with diffusion and cross-diffusion to describe the interaction between vegetation and soil water. First, the existence of Hopf bifurcation and cross-diffusion-driven Turing instability are discussed. Then, based on the nonlinear analysis, we obtain the exact parameters range for stationary patterns and show the dynamical behavior near Turing bifurcation point. It is found that the model has the properties of gap, strip and spot patterns. Moreover, the small water-uptake ability of vegetation roots promotes the growth of vegetation and the transitions of vegetation pattern. But with the continuous increase of the water-uptake ability of vegetation roots, the local vegetation biomass density increases and the isolation between vegetation patches also increases, which may induce the emergence of desertification. In addition, our results reveal that the water consumption rate induces the transitions of vegetation pattern and prohibits the increase of vegetation biomass density. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Kunming is the capital city of Yunnan Province and a bridgehead city facing South Asia and Southeast Asia. With the rapid development of Kunming's economy and society, the urbanization rate continues to increase, and the quality of the ecological environment in this area is also changing rapidly. How to quickly and accurately obtain the temporal and spatial pattern evolution of Kunming's ecological environment quality and explore the driving factors is of great significance to the realization of ecological environmental protection and sustainable development of Kunming. In this paper, the Google Earth Engine (GEE) platform is used to use the long-term Landsat remote sensing image data to mask the water body, extract greenness, dryness, humidity and heat, and construct the remote sensing ecological index RSEI through PCA. Using spatial analysis methods such as cold and hot spot analysis and center of gravity migration to explore the evolution of the spatio-temporal pattern of ecological environment quality in Kunming from 2000 to 2019, and use single-factor analysis and interactive detection in geographic detectors to analyze its internal driving forces. The results show, (1) From 1995 to 2019, the quality of the ecological environment in Kunming showed a trend of first increasing-then decreasing-then increasing. The overall ecological environment quality was in a general state in the past 25 years, but the ecological environment continued to improve. (2) In the past 25 years, the ecological environment quality grade area of Kunming City is, medium ecological environment area > good ecological environment area > poor ecological environment area > poor ecological environment area > excellent ecological environment area. From the perspective of spatial distribution, the ecological environment quality presents The spatial distribution pattern of high in the southwest and poor in the northeast. (3) From 1995 to 2019, the centers of the standard deviation ellipse of Kunming's ecological environment were relatively close to each other, and the major axes all showed a south-north direction. (4) In Kunming, the ecological environment quality is poor in areas with concentrated rocky desertification, concentrated water and soil erosion, concentrated population and rapid urban expansion, while areas with better ecological environment mostly have higher vegetation coverage. Population and slope are the human activity factors and natural factors that dominate the spatial distribution of ecological environment in Kunming, respectively. Slope, population and GDP, together with other factors, have a significant impact on the quality of ecological environment in Kunming. (5) In the future, Kunming City should rigorously prioritize the protection of key ecological areas, enhance ecological conservation and restoration efforts, optimize land use and development, continuously enhance the quality of the ecological environment, and achieve synchronous and sustainable development of the ecological environment and the economy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Lanzhou City is located in the semi-arid region of northwest China, which experiences serious desertification. Moreover, the high intensity of land development, with the accelerated industrialization and urbanization, causes increasingly aggravated conflict between humans and the environment. Exploring the response of the ecological environment quality to the natural environment and anthropogenic activities is important to protect the sustainable development of urban economic construction and the environment. Based on the Google Earth Engine (GEE) platform, this paper constructed a modified Remote Sensing Ecological Index (MRSEI) model which could reflect the ecological environment quality by integrating the desertification index (DI) into the Remote Sensing Ecological index (RSEI) model. This paper explores the spatiotemporal variation in the environmental quality from 2000 to 2020 in Lanzhou, China, and analyzes the natural and anthropogenic factors affecting the environment quality in terms of temperature, precipitation, gross domestic product (GDP), land use, night lighting, and population. The results showed that the mean value of MRSEI ranged from 0.254 to 0.400. The area undergoing fast growth in ecological quality was in the northwestern part of Lanzhou, and the area of decrease was in the central part. Various factors have different degrees of influence on the ecosystem, with temperature, precipitation, and land use having a greater impact, and GDP and population having a limited impact. Precipitation and temperature showed a strong impact when interacting with other factors, demonstrating that precipitation and temperature were also key factors affecting MRSEI. Overall, climate change and the implementation of ecological restoration projects have led to an improvement in the quality of the ecological environment in Lanzhou. This study provides a reference for understanding the spatiotemporal changes in the ecological environment in semi-arid Lanzhou and is conducive to formulating proper protection strategies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With the wide application of remote sensing technology, target detection based on deep learning has become a research hotspot in the field of remote sensing. In this paper, aimed at the problems of the existing deep-learning-based desert land intelligent extraction methods, such as the spectral similarity of features and unclear texture features, we propose a multispectral remote sensing image desert land intelligent extraction method that takes into account band information. Firstly, we built a desert land intelligent interpretation dataset based on band weighting to enhance the desert land foreground features of the images. On this basis, we introduced the deformable convolution adaptive feature extraction capability to U-Net and developed the Y-Net model to extract desert land from Landsat remote sensing images covering the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region. Finally, in order to analyze the spatial and temporal trends of the desert land in the study area, we used a structural equation model (SEM) to evaluate the direct and indirect effects of natural conditions and human activities, i.e., population density (PD), livestock volume (LS), evaporation (Evp), temperature (T), days of sandy wind conditions (LD), humidity (RH), precipitation (P), anthropogenic disturbance index (Adi), and cultivated land (CL). The results show that the F1-score of the Y-Net model proposed in this paper is 95.6%, which is 11.5% more than that of U-Net. Based on the Landsat satellite images, the area of desert land in the study area for six periods from 1990 to 2020 was extracted. The results show that the area of desert land in the study area first increased and then decreased. The main influencing factors have been precipitation, humidity, and anthropogenic disturbance, for which the path coefficients are 0.646, 0.615, and 0.367, respectively. This study will be of great significance in obtaining large-scale and long-term time series of desert land cover and revealing the inner mechanism of desert land area change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Chinese Loess Plateau, a region of remarkable ecological and economic value, grapples with significant water management challenges due to its distinctive geology and climate. This perspective offers a short review of the eco-environmental protection measures undertaken in the Loess Plateau, underscoring the transformative impacts of initiatives such as the "Grain for Green" project. However, it also highlights the enduring challenges, including land degradation, water resources issues, socio-economic inequities, and the implications of climate change. Particularly, water management emerges as a pivotal issue with far-reaching repercussions for soil conservation, biodiversity, and human livelihoods. The paper concludes by proposing future actions, emphasizing the necessity for policy modifications, novel initiatives, and research to tackle these challenges and foster sustainable development in the Loess Plateau. The insights gained from this region could offer invaluable lessons for other regions confronted with similar challenges, thereby contributing to global efforts to mitigate desertification and champion sustainable development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With the rapid rise of infrastructure construction in southwestern mountainous areas of China, tunnel engineering has become increasingly frequent in crossing faults with strong activity. However, there has been a long-term lack of an effective theoretical method for identifying the stability and controlling the deformation of extremely weak surrounding rocks inside active faults. Therefore, this paper researched stability analysis and deformation control of a tunnel with extremely weak surrounding rocks caused by strike-slip fault activity. Firstly, uniaxial and triaxial compression tests were conducted on completely decomposed granite within active faults under drained and undrained conditions, and the mechanical properties of granite after desertification and argillization were analyzed. Then, based on the upper-bound limit theory and according to the relationship between the safety factor, instability trace, and geo-stress, a theoretical method to evaluate the stability of the unsupported surrounding rock under different geo-stress levels was proposed. Furthermore, a comprehensive deformation control method, including advanced support, excavation face reinforcement, and radial grouting, was proposed, and the applicability of this method was analyzed and verified through field mechanics and deformation measurements. The results showed that under the triaxial stress state, the post-peak stress drop characteristics of completely decomposed granite basically disappear, and the plastic deformation characteristics of rock become prominent. The comprehensive strengthening scheme has a significant deformation control effect, and the surrounding rock deformation can be reduced by over 65%. In addition, the pressure on the supporting structure will be more than 3.2 times higher with no reinforcement scheme. Highlights A comprehensive deformation control scheme has been proposed to prevent and control deformation disasters in extremely weak surrounding rocks caused by strike-slip fault activity. An upper-bound limit theory considering the influence of geo-stress is established to judge the stability of the unsupported surrounding rock. The mechanical properties of completely decomposed granite caused by strike-slip fault activity under drained and undrained conditions are analyzed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Land desertification is one of the serious ecological and environmental problems facing mankind today, which threatens the survival and development of human society. China is one of the countries with the most serious land desertification problems in the world. Therefore, it is of great theoretical value and practical significance to carry out accurate identification and monitoring of land desertification and its influencing factors in ecologically fragile areas of China. This is conducive to curbing land desertification and ensuring regional ecological security. Minqin County, Gansu Province, located in northwestern China, is one of the most serious areas of land desertification, which is also one of the four sandstorm sources in China. Based on ENVINet5, this paper constructs a high-precision land desertification identification method with an accuracy of 93.71%, which analyzes the trend and reasons of land desertification in this area, provides suggestions for disaster prevention in Minqin County. and provides a reference for other similar areas to make corresponding desertification control policies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper is focused on the following research objectives: (1) characterization of the elements of physical-geographic similarity of the Oltenia Plain, (2) recording the evolution over time of temperature and precipitation parameters from the five meteorological stations located in the surveyed area (3) analysis of the index of desertification (De Martonne), and (4) investigating the distribution of vegetation (CLC), which may bring changes in the analysis of interval 1990-2018. The extreme meteorological phenomenon –desertification - for the Oltenia Plain was analysed in terms of time and space, through the calculation and statistical interpretation of the Martonne Index. In Oltenia Plain, there is an obvious altitudinal zoning of vegetation as result of the fact that the altitude increases from the south (about 18-50 m in the Danube Meadow) to the north (about 200 m in the Getic Piedmont), which means a decrease in temperatures in highlands, and, to a certain extent, an increase in the amounts of average annual precipitation in the meadow areas. The purpose of this research was the analysis of the vegetation's territorial distribution, taking into account the values, the “De Martonne” desertification? Index, the information presented in books and scientific articles, but also the Corine Land Cover statistical database (CLC 1990/2012- 2018). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents a summary of work undertaken by the authors and their teams on a series of Qe'an (plural of Qa'), in the Badia of eastern Jordan. These basins are foci for settlement in the region, with the sites described here (Shubayqa, Wisad and the Qa' Qattafi) edged by archaeological sites dating from the late Epipalaeolithic (ca. 14,500 - 11,600 cal BP) and the Neolithic (ca. 11,700 - 6100 cal BP), and in areas still used by people today as seasonal wetlands for watering animals and growing cereal. We assess here the potential for the Qe'an sediments to provide what would be rare continuous palaeoenvironmental records for this part of SW Asia. The paper presents the first dates from the Qe'an of this region and the outline sedimentology. Much of the fill is of Holocene age, which leads to discussion of climate and landscape change over the last 15,000 years, particularly due to the close geographical relationship between these basins and archaeology. Our optically stimulated luminescence and radiocarbon dating of the basin fill suggests that there was significantly more space in the landscape for water storage in the early Holocene, which may have therefore provided this resource for people and their livestock or game for a longer duration each year than that seen today. Linked to this are hypotheses of a more vegetated landscape during this time period. Given the environmentally marginal nature of our study area subtle changes in landscape and/or climate, and human exploitation of these resources, could have led to significant, and likely detrimental for its inhabitants, environmental impacts for the region, such as desertification. Our data are suggestive of desertification occurring, and sets up a clear hypothesis for testing by future work in the region. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Land use and land cover (LULC) changes have some implications on land–atmosphere interactions, surface energy budget, and hydrological cycle. The understanding of LULC changes and their interactions with the environment provide better management of agriculture, forests, and water resources. LULC changes are frequently observed in developing countries such as Türkiye and much research has been conducted in this field. However, few studies investigated the countrywide LULC changes and their interactions with energy fluxes and precipitation. In this paper, LULC changes in Türkiye over the last two decades have been evaluated by utilizing an Enhanced Vegetation Index (EVI) derived from the Terra satellite. The latent and sensible heat fluxes were obtained from the Modern-Era Retrospective analysis for Research and Applications (MERRA-2) reanalysis datasets. Precipitation data were acquired from the Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission (TRMM) satellite. The results showed that EVI has an increasing trend over Türkiye between 2000 and 2021, while climate change–induced desertification, droughts, and forest fires have threatened the vegetative cover in some portions of the country. The latent heat flux has a rising trend due to increasing vegetative cover and irrigated areas. A slight reduction was observed in sensible heat flux, while a sharp increase was witnessed in specific humidity. EVI represented a high positive correlation (R = 0.84) with sensible heat flux and a moderate positive correlation (R = 0.69) with latent heat flux. No significant relation was determined between EVI and precipitation on a monthly basis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

C, N and P are the key biogenic elements of terrestrial ecosystems, and their biogeochemical processes regulate nutrient cycling and play a key role in restoring degraded ecosystems. In this paper, the grassland ecosystem under artificial restoration measures (Dactylis glomerata (DG), Lolium perenne (LP), Lolium perenne + Trifolium repens (LT)), and the natural restoration measures (NG) in a typical karst plateau desertification control area of southwest China, were taken as the research object. The C, N, and P concentrations and the ecological stoichiometry of the plant–soil–microorganism system in grasslands under different restoration measures in the karst desertification area were explored. We established the following findings: (1) Compared with NG, the C, N and P concentrations of plants and soil in DG, LP and LT were higher, and LT was the highest. (2) The microbial biomass carbon (MBC), microbial biomass nitrogen (MBN) and microbial biomass phosphorus (MBP) concentrations in LT was also the highest. (3) The C:N ratio of plant and soil indicated that the N mineralization and nutrient release rate of DG, LP and LT were stronger than that of NG, and the plant growth of NG was most seriously limited by nitrogen. The N:P ratio in plant and soil indicated that the grassland was limited by P in the four treatments. (4) The result of correlation analysis showed that the cycling process of C, N and P in the plant–soil–microorganism system was coupled, and that the elements closely affected each other. In general, the effect of artificial restoration on a degraded ecosystem was relatively better than the natural restoration for increasing plant, soil and microbial nutrient concentrations, especially in the mixed-seed ecosystem of leguminous and gramineous forage. However, in the future, grassland management, appropriate N fertilizer or N-fixing plants and P fertilizer should be considered to improve the limitation of plant N and P, so as to realize the sustainable development of grasslands and the restoration of degraded ecosystems in the karst desertification control area. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, the climate and environmental datasets were processed by the scripts of Generic Mapping Tools (GMT) and R to evaluate changes in climate parameters, vegetation patters and land cover types in Burkina Faso. Located in the southern Sahel zone, Burkina Faso experiences one of the most extreme climatic hazards in sub-saharan Africa varying from the extreme floods in Volta River Basin, to desertification and recurrent droughts.. The data include the TerraClimate dataset and satellite images Landsat 8-9 Operational Land Imager (OLI) and Thermal Infrared (TIRS) C2 L1. The dynamics of target climate characteristics of Burkina Faso was visualised for 2013-2022 using remote sensing data. To evaluate the environmental dynamics the TerraClimate data were used for visualizing key climate parameter: extreme temperatures, precipitation, soil moisture, downward surface shortwave radiation, vapour pressure deficit and anomaly. The Palmer Drought Severity Index (PDSI) was modelled over the study area to estimate soil water balance related to the soil moisture conditions as a prerequisites for vegetation growth. The land cover types were mapped using the k-means clustering by R. Two vegetation indices were computed to evaluate the changes in vegetation patterns over recent decade. These included the Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) and the Soil-Adjusted Vegetation Index (SAVI) The scripts used for cartographic workflow are presented and discussed. This study contributes to the environmental mapping of Burkina Faso with aim to highlight the links between the climate processes and vegetation dynamics in West Africa. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Synergistically enhancing and realizing the value of grassland ecosystem services (ES) for economic activity is an important but challenging task for achieving sustainability in the karst desertification control (KDC). However, how to use grassland ES value characteristics in the KDC to make decisions on ES improvement, human well-being enhancement, and sustainable development remains unclear. In this paper, we took the contiguous region of karst desertification in Yunnan-Guangxi-Guizhou, China, a global hotspot, as the study area. Based on the valuation of the gross ecosystem product (GEP) and county economic intensity, we analyzed the structural and spatial characteristics of grassland GEP in the KDC using spatial analysis methods. We found that: (1) the grassland GEP in the KDC is mainly distributed in counties with low economic intensity (86.05% of the total number of counties) and vulnerable to losses caused by the livelihood of farmers; (2) the grassland GEP in the KDC is spatially small and scattered (the geographic concentration lies between 0.015 and 0.237), which makes it difficult to form industrial scale advantages; (3) the public product index (66.22–96.77%) and industry scale concentration (97.87–99.86%) of grassland GEP in the KDC are high, and most of the GEP is difficult to transform on the private market. Based on our findings, we proposed three corresponding recommendations for economic decision-making. The results of this study can provide a reference for economic decision-making regarding the management of grassland ES in karst areas with similar conditions and beyond. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Arabsphere struggles with highly complicated water challenges due to climate change, desertification, coronavirus pandemic, and Russo-Ukrainian War. This paper explores how to build a robust water vision to pave the road to achieving sustainable development goals (SDGs) in the Arabsphere. A sustainable water future (SWF) necessitates an interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary research strategy. 'Horizon scanning' process (HSP) is one of the promising foresight methodologies. A generic process for "Horizon scanning" has been developed to cope with water crises and challenges. "DEEPEST" holistic framework has been designed to suit both the "Futurology" science and water, environment, and engineering disciplines. "DEEPEST" characterizes Demographics, Ecological, Environmental, Political, Economic, Social, and Technological features. The macro-future factors (MFF) applied in the foresight process (FP) have been presented. The results showed that Water conservation (WC), Circular Water (CW), and Emerging Water Technologies (EWTs) were the main outcomes of the 'Horizon scanning' process (HSP). The paper concluded that the preparing for a sustainable water future (SWF) must be right now and the opportunities range from the deepest water drop to the highest water drop on Earth. The essence of the conclusion is hydrosphere sustainability, particularly in Arabsphere, should be given extreme concentration, effort, and support. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An important problem currently faced by karst rocky desertification management is the degradation of vegetation fruits, which encourages the search for a solution for the sustainable growth of vegetation. Water and fertilizer are key factors affecting crop quality (the formation of soluble solids, protein, amino acids, soluble sugar content, etc.). A comprehensive review of research related to water–fertilizer coupling and crop quality improvement may be beneficial for rocky desertification control. This study analyzed 427 related papers, and the results showed that: (1) the number of published papers showed an "S" curve growth trend over time, indicating that research in the field of water–fertilizer coupling has entered a mature stage after rapid growth, yet it is still in the initial stage in karst areas; (2) the research was mainly theoretical, but also included technology research and development, model construction, demonstration and extension, and monitoring and evaluation; (3) except for research related to greenhouse facilities, the research areas are mainly located in arid and semi-arid regions. The study further revealed (4) the frontier theory of water–fertilizer coupling and crop quality research. Finally, it was found that the theoretical and technical studies related to water–fertilizer coupling and crop quality improvement in karst areas are insufficient. Whether the existing theories and techniques are applicable to karst areas needs further verification. In addition to the areas of selecting germplasm with high water/fertilizer utilization efficiency and tolerance to rocky desertification, further improvement in the dynamic model of water–fertilizer coupling and the construction of a more applicable water–fertilizer coupling model could also be future research hotspots. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In China, backfill mining has been selected as an effective approach to realize the green mining of underground coal resources, where backfill materials are the major factor in the development of backfill mining. In order to provide a better reference for further research and development of backfill mining, the experience and research achievements are reviewed in this paper. Firstly, the backfill materials that have been successfully applied in Chinese underground backfill coal mining are divided into two categories according to whether water is used during the backfill mining operation. Then, the primary considerations of each backfill material during its preparation, transportation and activation stages are discussed and evaluated. Finally, suggestions for backfill material exploration are proposed in terms of the future backfill mining of coal resources in Western China, where there is serious surface desertification. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

China started the pilot project of subsidy on desertification land protection in 2013. It had been established that 71 national desertification regions were closed and protected, and followed up to monitor for several years in five northwest provinces, Inner Mongolia and Tibet since 2016, while the valuable research conclusion had not been stilly taken. In this paper, the related research and practice at domestic and abroad were reviewed. The four suggestions were put forward for the problem to be solved in time by discussing the closed target and theoretical carrying capacity, based on the key factors on affecting grassland vegetation, the more important issues and the effect of grazing prohibition and monitor as follow. 1) The achievement of investigation and monitor of closed sand land and grazing prohibition during the past years should be concluded in time for providing the basis for government management and improving the closed sand land and grazing prohibition scheme and the next decision-making. 2) The theoretical carrying capacity of desertification region should be determined, such as the actual safe carrying capacity by the basis of the theoretical carrying capacity. 3) In order to improve the practical value of monitoring data, the monitored plot should be compressed, and further revised the monitoring index system. 4) The monitoring research on the benefit of closed sand land and grazing prohibition should be shifted from monitoring the response of vegetation by grazing intensity in the past to monitoring the response of land desertification. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Clues of climate change on the Alashan Plateau since the last glacial period (40 ka) are important for revealing the mechanism of desertification of middle-latitude deserts in the Northern Hemisphere (NH). Studies are still rare for the understanding of the specific relationship of climate changes between the Alashan Plateau and the global. Based on a systematic and comparative analysis of the existing research in China and the international academic community, this paper reviews the environmental evolution history of the Alashan Plateau since the last glacial period from the records of paleo-environment and geomorphological characteristics in different deserts of the plateau (e.g., Badanjilin, Tenggeli, and Wulanbuhe). From about 40 ka to the end of the last glacial maximum, the climate on the plateau was wetter than it is today, and to the end of the Pleistocene, the climate was generally dry and the aeolian activities were enhanced. However, the climate was arid during the whole last glacial period in the Wulanbuhe Desert, evidently different from the overall pattern of the plateau. The Tenggeli Desert was characterized by an arid climate in the early Holocene. The most controversial events for the Alashan Plateau are the drought events in the middle Holocene in the Badanjilin Desert. The role and impact of the westerlies and the East Asian Summer Monsoon (EASM) systems on the climate change of the desert and even the whole plateau is a vexed question that brings different views in different periods. There is still a lack of definite evidence representing the events of global environmental change that occurred on the plateau during the discussed period. The distinctive morphology of dune mountains and the distribution of sand dunes are mutually indicative of the direction and energy of wind systems on the plateau. It is suggested that appropriate wind energy is the significant key to the desertification in these middle-latitude deserts on the plateau. From a global-scale review of climate change, the desertification of the modern-scale sandy desert landscapes on the Alashan Plateau is generally related to the global glacial period and the cold and dry climate during the past 40 ka. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Desertification is one of the main obstacles to global sustainable development. Monitoring, evaluating and mastering its driving factors are very important for the prevention and control of desertification. As one of the largest deserts in China, the development of desertification in Otindag Sandy Land (OSL) resulted in the reduction in land productivity and serious ecological/environmental consequences. Although many ecological restoration projects have been carried out, the vegetation restoration of OSL and the impact mechanism of climate and human activities on desertification remain unclear. Methods: Taking OSL as the research area, this paper constructs the desertification index by using the remote sensing images and meteorological and socio-economic data, between 1986 and 2016, and analyzes the spatio-temporal evolution process and driving factors of desertification by using trend analysis and spearman rank correlation. Results: The results showed that: (1) Desertification in the OSL has fluctuated greatly during the past 30 years. Desertification recovered between 1986 and 1990, expanded and increased between 1990 and 2000, reduced between 2000 and 2004, developed rapidly between 2004 and 2007, and recovered again between 2007 and 2016; (2) The desertification of OSL is dominated by a non-significant change trend, accounting for 73.27%. In the significant change trend, the area of desertification rising trend is 20.32%, which is mainly located in the north and east, and the area of declining trend is 6.41%, which is mainly located in the southwest; (3) Desertification is the result of the superposition of climate and human activities. Climate change is the main influencing factor, followed by human activities, and the superposition effects of the two are spatio-temporal differences. Conclusions: These results shed light on the development of desertification in OSL and the relative importance and complex interrelationship between human activities and climate in regulating the process of desertification. Based on this, we suggest continuing to implement the ecological restoration policy and avoid the destruction of vegetation by large-scale animal husbandry in order to improve the situation of desertification. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Environmental degradation is a problem arising from natural causes and human actions despoiling under the Earth's surface. Between the arid, semi-arid and dry sub-humid climatic zones of planet Earth, a type of environmental degradation in an advanced stage can occur: desertification. In Brazil, this can occur in the semi-arid territory, given the seriousness of the problem and the socio-environmental configuration of this space, and studies that reveal its state of degradation are important. In this sense, this paper aims to identify the treatment given to desertification in approaches to environmental degradation in the Brazilian semi-arid region. To this end, an integrative systematic review of the literature was carried out, based on a search protocol supported by the specialized literature on scientific methodology, criteria for analyzing theses, dissertations and scientific articles present in the Portal de Periódico Capes and Base Digital Brasileira de Teses e Dissertations. Thus, the data resulting from the systematic review demonstrated that, although there is a diversity of approaches, a significant part of the studies on the degradation of the brazilian semi-arid region establish a direct and indirect relationship with desertification, as only a minority focuses on the study of desertification in its objectives, which demonstrates the need to study desertification in the Brazilian semi-arid region. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Currently, the monitoring of rocky desertification(RD) is concentrated in the karst area, whereas the study in red-bed areas is rare. In this paper, we present a multi-scale classification framework for RD monitoring based on spectral-spatial features. At the pixel scale, we explored several spectral indices based on spectral statistics and separability analysis of land cover samples. The homogeneous land covers were classified by the decision rules from the selected spectral indices (such as NDIOI, NRRI and NDGI); At the patch scale, RD classes were further distinguished by spatial decision rules based on multiple neighborhood features including proximity, linear density, and buffer distance. The method was applied on an OLI image over the red-bed area of northwestern Jiangxi, south central China, and validated using ground-based observations. The experimental results of verification and comparison are satisfactory. This work demonstrates a methodological supplement to the monitoring of red bed RD. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Dryland regions are particularly challenging for human survival over the course of deep time. This is true for institutionally complex communities as well as small-scale societies that have existed in semi-arid regions throughout the Holocene. This paper examines some of the successful strategies employed by small-scale mobile communities which enhanced their ability to thrive in drylands over the course of thousands of years. Small-scale societies living in drylands must rely on the transmission of Traditional Ecological Knowledge across generations. Some of this knowledge relates to the availability and use of wetlands and other more ephemeral water sources, the exploitation of a diverse range of resources, and the potential for natural storage of food resources as a buffer against regularly occurring drought years in these regions. We compare this understanding with our environmental archeological findings at the Mid-Holocene site of Zaraa Uul in the eastern Gobi Desert of Mongolia. At the site of Zaraa Uul, we show how hunter-gatherer groups returned to a campsite near the edge of a wetland environment over the course of at least two phases during the Mid-Holocene. Here they took advantage of a greater diversity of animal species and plants, including small-grained-grasses and sedges, which could enhance their caloric intake and increase the potential for storable commodities which could be collected as needed from their natural habitat. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Ecological science focuses on the structure and function of the natural environment. However, the study of ecological environments primarily focuses on single-element research and lacks a comprehensive perspective. To examine ecological environmental trends on different scales, the present paper selected Yunnan Province as the study area. Chemical oxygen demand, rocky desertification, forest coverage, natural disaster data and spatial analysis methods were used to obtain the ecological environmental characteristics of each county and construct a comprehensive evaluation method of the ecological environment. The present paper revealed that the environmental capacity in Yunnan Province was at a moderate level, the ecological environment fragility was remarkable, the significance of the ecological environment was very high, natural disasters occurred frequently, and spatial differentiation between ecological environments was obvious. The province may be divided into three functional areas: the comprehensive-balanced area, the efficiency-dominated area and the environment-dominated area. Central Yunnan was a key development zone and the main area for the manufacturing and service industries, which were built as a modern industrial system in Yunnan Province. The ecological environment in northwestern Yunnan and southern Yunnan is of high significance, and this region was an ecological environment protection area that was important area for the construction of the modern agricultural system in Yunnan Province. To achieve sustainable development of the ecological environment, the spatial characteristics of the ecological environment must be determined at the county scale. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Gully erosion is a major threat to ecosystems, potentially leading to desertification, land degradation, and crop loss. Developing viable gully erosion prevention and remediation strategies requires regular monitoring of the gullies. Nevertheless, it is highly challenging to automatically access the monitoring results of the gullies from the latest monitoring data by training historical data acquired by different sensors at different times. To this end, this paper presents a novel semi-supervised semantic segmentation with boundary-guided pseudo-label generation strategy and adaptive loss function method. This method takes full advantage of the historical data with labels and the latest monitoring data without labels to obtain the latest monitoring results of the gullies. The boundary-guided pseudo-label generation strategy (BPGS), guided by the inherent boundary maps of real geographic objects, fuses multiple evidence data to generate reliable pseudo-labels. Additionally, we propose an adaptive loss function based on centroid similarity (CSIM) to further alleviate the impact of pseudo-label noise. To verify the proposed method, two datasets for gully erosion monitoring are constructed according to the satellite data acquired in northeastern China. Extensive experiments demonstrate that the proposed method is more appropriate for automatic gully erosion monitoring than four state-of-the-art methods, including supervised methods and semi-supervised methods. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The oasis-desert ecotone as a transitional zone is sensitive and vulnerable to hydro-climatic changes and anthropogenic activities in maintaining oasis stability and combating desertification. The normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI) is an important indicator for evaluating the desert vegetation restoration status. However, it is difficult to quantify individual and interactive impacts of hydro-climatic changes and anthropogenic activities on NDVI in the oasis-desert ecotone. This paper introduces the hydro-climate elasticity and geographical detector approach to assess the influences of hydro-climate changes and human activities on NDVI in Qira oasis-desert ecotone, Northwest China during 2000–2019. Results show that the climatic elasticities of NDVI reflect that the NDVI is more sensitive to precipitation (0.318) than to temperature (0.290), while the NDVI becomes more sensitive to variation in soil moisture content (0.219) than that in the groundwater table (0.150) in hydrological elasticities. The land-use change caused by human activities results in a decrease of NDVI, accounting for 90% of NDVI reduction. The human activities indicate the strongest influence on NDVI. The nonparametric elasticity estimator proposed is illustrated good agreement with the spatiotemporal synchronism of NDVI to hydro-climatic changes. The interaction analysis of geographical detector reveals that the interaction among influencing factors has a bivariate enhancement relationship and a nonlinear enhancement effect on NDVI. This study contributes to clarifying the individual influencing and interactive relationships of NDVI to hydro-climatic factors and human activities, and assist land restoration practitioners to evaluate the desert vegetation restoration status under current and future hydro-climatic changes in arid regions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents a literature review of black locust (Robinia pseudoacacia L.) and the knowledge accumulated by Romanian foresters and researchers, covering species propagation, stand management, and vulnerability issues. As highlighted by numerous authors, black locust manifests dual features, both as an exogenous species and one that is already naturalized. The main drivers for this species' expansion in Romania is its ecological adaptability on degraded lands, fast growth, and high biomass yields, in addition to other economic benefits. Black locust plantations and coppices also offer an important range of ecosystem services such as CO2 sequestration, landscape reclamation, fuel wood, or maintaining traditional crafts in regions with little to no forest cover. Highlighted disadvantages include short lifespan, invasiveness when introduced on fertile sites, and dieback in drought/frost prone areas. The results of extensive research and studies are captured in technical norms, although aspects such as species genetics, invasive potential, and adaptation to climate change dynamics call for more research and optimizing in species management. As Romania rallies its efforts with those of the international community in order to address climate change and desertification, black locust stands out as a proven solution for reclaiming degraded lands when native species are not an alternative. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since the 20th century, the resources and environment in Northeast China have changed, and it is one of the typical regions that have short-term or high-intensity environmental impacts in the world. However, due to the excessive consumption of regional resources and strong environmental pollution to the atmospheric environment, development is being greatly affected. Maintaining the natural ecological environment has become a very urgent task. This paper studies the important ecological environment problems in Northeast China from the perspective of double carbon goals. The study points out that there are ecological problems in Northeast China, such as the lack of forest resources, the aggravation of desertification, the decline of black soil quality, and the shrinkage of wetlands, which are severe urban environmental protection problems. At the same time, affected by the trend of world environmental change, policy drivers in Northeast China, and some relatively new environmental pollution problems, the natural environmental quality of Northeast China will still have a significant decline in the future. The future development of Northeast China will be based on the perspective of double carbon goals, constantly improve the ecological environment monitoring system, strengthen the research of scientific and technological system, strengthen innovation, and vigorously develop circular economy and further improve the construction of basic systems. Through a series of ecological environment governance and the coordinated development of economy and ecological environment, the dual growth of economy and ecological environment in Northeast China will be realized, and the overall revitalization of the old industrial zone in Northeast China will be realized. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Surface air temperature is a critical element in the surface–atmosphere interaction, energy exchange, and water cycle. Multi-source fusion reanalysis products (hereafter referred to as reanalysis) have spatiotemporal continuity and broad applicability that can provide key data support for various studies such as glacier melting, soil freeze-thaw and desertification, ecosystem, and climate change in the alpine region of the Qinghai–Tibet Plateau (QTP). Surface air temperature observations collected at 17 weather stations in the High-cold region Observation and Research Network for Land Surface Process and Environment of China (HORN) over the period of 2017–2018 are implemented to evaluate the advanced and widely used surface air temperature reanalysis datasets, which include the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF) Fifth Generation Land Surface Reanalysis (ERA5L), the U.S. Global Land Data Assimilation System (GLDAS), and China Meteorological Administration Land Data Assimilation System (CLDAS). Results are as follows: (1) Evaluation results of temporal changes and spatial distribution characteristics indicate that the three reanalysis datasets are consistent with in-situ observations in the alpine region of the QTP. CLDAS is more consistent with observations and can better describe details of temperature distribution and variation than ERA5L and GLDAS. (2) For the evaluation period, CLDAS is 0.53 °C higher than the in-situ observation, while ERA5L and GLDAS are lower than the in-situ observation by −3.45 °C and −1.40 °C, respectively. (3) The accuracy of CLDAS is better than ERA5L and GLDAS under different elevations and land covers. We resampled three reanalysis datasets with a spatial resolution of 0.25° and used the two most common interpolation methods to analyze the impact of spatial resolution and different interpolation methods on the evaluation results. We found that the impact is small. In summary, the three reanalysis datasets all have certain applicability in the alpine region of the QTP, and the accuracy of CLDAS is significantly higher than ERA5L and GLDAS. The results of the present paper have important implications for the selection of reanalysis data in the studies of climate, ecosystem, and sustainable development in the QTP. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Despite the considerable constraints of karst rocky desertification on the production and life of the locals and the regional economy, few studies have been conducted on areas with karst rocky desertification with the aim of exploring the balance between ecological governance and industrial development. In light of the promotion of featured advantageous industries to ecological governance and industrial development, this study aims to explore the mechanism of industrial revitalization in areas with karst rocky desertification to provide theoretical support for their industrial revitalization. Based on actor‐network theory, this paper presents a case study of Bashan village, a typical area in Guizhou province, China, with karst rocky desertification, to clarify the course of development of its Zanthoxylum bungeanum industry and propose a mechanism for its revitalization. The findings identify the main actors of the revitalization of the Z. bungeanum industry and reveal the driving forces behind it. Moreover, the study found that the industrial revitalization model is a bottom‐up process, which suggests strong endogenous dynamics. Through the revitalization of the featured industries, the results of the management of rocky desertification are transformed into economic output, which improved the livelihood of farmers and consolidated the effectiveness of management. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Desertification in karst is an effect of climate change and not sustainable anthropogenic activities, the combination of which, however, causes the gradual loss of karst natural resources, such as soil, vegetation, and groundwater. A considerable percentage of global karst areas is found in drylands, characterized by negative water balance and scarce presence of soils. High fragility of the karst environment, and its vulnerability to land degradation and pollution because of the peculiar anisotropic setting, environmental dynamics, and of the direct connection between the surface and the subsurface, are at the origin of the severe problems deriving from desertification processes in karst. In addition to natural drivers, such as geology and topography, karst desertification is generally due to four main factors, mostly or partly related to human activity: deforestation, improper land use, groundwater overexploitation, and climate changes. Through the analysis of a collection of studies conducted in several karst territories around the world, the present paper aims to provide an overview of the processes leading to desertification risks in karst areas. Emphasizing the need to preserve these fragile environments, characterized by peculiar features and precious freshwater resources, this review summarizes the main situations at the global scale of rocky desertification in karst, at the same time providing indications for developing innovative and multi-disciplinary approaches addressed toward mitigation of the risk related to desertification in karst. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As an important part of the Earth's environmental system, sandy soils are particularly sensitive to changes in the climatic environment. As one of the four major desert regions in China, the MuUs desert has transformed from a desert to an oasis after more than half a century of ecological management. In this paper, we analyzed the spatial and temporal patterns of surface albedo, evapotranspiration, and fraction vegetation cover in the MuUs desert based on the Global Land Surface Satellite (GLASS) product with high spatial and temporal resolution and assessed the relationships between their variability and snow cover, air temperature, and precipitation. It is of great significance to understand the effect of desertification control and climate change after the conversion of land surface types in the MuUs region. The results show that the desertification control in the MuUs area has achieved remarkable results since 1982. The fraction vegetation coverage of the MuUs desert showed a significant increasing trend, with an interannual change rate of 1.32% each decade−1. The surface albedo of MuUs desert decreased significantly. Affected by vegetation and snow cover, it was lower in summer and higher in winter. The evapotranspiration showed a significant upward trend, higher in summer and lower in winter, which is significantly correlated with the changes in surface albedo, air temperature, and vegetation. In addition, the local-scale biophysical effects caused by vegetation change have influenced the climate of the MuUs region, manifested as the increase in precipitation and air temperature. In general, with the support of relevant policies and human construction projects, the overall ecological environment in the MuUs desert is developing in a good way. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objectives: Intelligent interpretation based on high-resolution remote sensing is an important way to realize the fine generation and rapid update of geographic information. Based on the background of fine-accurate geographical application using remote sensing, this paper analyzes the limitations of remote sensing information products in production and application. We explain the necessity of remote sensing serving geographical research and the key of coupling the fine shape of the map and the accurate content of the spectrum. Methods: Based on the basic understanding that geography guides the research of intelligent remote sensing, we first put forward the development direction and technical ideas of high-resolution remote sensing geoscience analysis based on fine geographical scenes. Then, we propose an intelligent computing mode via the space-time/satellite-ground collaboration. Furthermore, we take the evaluation of rocky desertification cultivated land in Guanling County, Guizhou Province, China as an application case. Results: Through this case study, three basic models, namely zoning-stratified perception, spatiotemporal synergistically inversion and multi-granular decision-making, are used to show how to carry out fine-accurate application by high-resolution remote sensing collaborative computing in complex mountain areas from a comprehensive perspective of refinement, quantification and topicalization. Conclusions: Combined with the previous work experience and practical cognition, several key scientific problems are discussed, such as spatial expression using irregular grids, multimodal reconstruction of temporal features, multi-source un‐ certainty analysis and iterative optimization guided by uncertainty. We give some potential study directions and research ideas in order to establish a more complete and feasible theoretical system and explore the development paths for the research on intelligent remote sensing under the guidance of geography and the fine-accurate geographical application with remote sensing data. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As typical of I Restoration Ecology i , the thematic series includes high quality papers that address critical research issues, consider practical solutions, or provide policy guidance for the restoration of arid lands. This issue of I Restoration Ecology i is part of the thematic series on arid land (dryland) restoration. Literature cited 1 Hallett JG, Omar SAS (2020) Restoration ecology of arid lands (RE-AL). [Extracted from the article]

Alpine wetlands in western Sichuan plateau (WSCP) are located on the eastern edge of the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau (QTP), where the ecological environment is very sensitive to global climate change. Being naturally driven coupled with unreasonable human development activities, alpine wetlands have experienced serious ecological and environmental issues such as drought, inversion, and desertification. However, due to the limitations of data sources and calculation models, it is impossible for us to deeply understand the change mechanism and spatial difference of the ecological environment of the alpine wetland (EEAW) in previous studies. In view of this, an innovative approach for monitoring the EEAW change has been proposed in this paper. We employ the approach to perform the EEAW change trend analysis, and some meaningful characteristics were founded. Specifically, it includes the fol1owing aspects. The air temperature increase is relatively significant, while the precipitation change has obvious spatial differentiation, and even some region's precipitation experienced a decrease especially in plot1. In Haizishan, Lugu Lake, and Bari Lake, we explored an interesting phenomenon that the precipitation increases first and then decrease, and the turning point occurred around 1999. Increases in air temperature and evaporation have aggravated the drought in high-latitude areas. The drought situation has been alleviated in high-altitude areas due to the acceleration of snow melt water. Wetland vegetation and biomass presented an overall increasing trend, but the degradation also occurs in some area, including Zoige and Lugu Lake area. The human activity disturbances of wetland degradation mainly include the settlements expansion, agricultural development, and the ecotourism prosperity. Among them, targeted poverty alleviation projects have accelerated the urbanization in WSCP, and the development of agriculture and tourism has increased the interference of wetlands. Additionally, we have used Landsat images and national wetland survey data (1999, 2013, and 2020 year) from the past two decades to verify the EEAW trend and confirm the reliability of the analysis results using this approach. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Rocky desertification is one of the most critical ecological and environmental problems in areas underlain by carbonate rocks globally. Land cover and land use in the region affects large-scale ecosystem processes on a global scale, and many Earth system models rely on accurate land cover information. Therefore, it is important to evaluate current global land cover products and to understand the differences between them, and the findings of these studies can provide guidance to different researchers when using or making land cover products. Whereas there are many studies on the assessment of coarser resolution land cover products, there are few studies on the assessment of higher resolution land cover products (10 m). In order to provide guidance for users of 10 m data, this paper uses the rock deserted southwest region of China as the experimental area. We analyzed the consistency and accuracy of the FROM-GLC, ESA WorldCover 10 and ESRI products using spatial pattern consistency, absolute accuracy assessment of three validation samples, and analyzed their intrinsic relationships among classification systems, classification methods, and validation samples. The results show that (1) the overall accuracy of the FROM-GLC product is the highest, ranging from 49.47 to 62.42%; followed by the overall accuracy of the ESA product, ranging from 45.13 to 64.50%; and the overall accuracy of the ESRI product is the lowest, between 39.03 and 61.94%. (2) The consistency between FROM-GLC and ESA is higher than the consistency between other products, with an area correlation coefficient of 0.94. Analysis of the spatial consistency of the three products shows that the proportion of perfectly consistent areas is low at 44.89%, mainly in areas with low surface heterogeneity and more homogeneous cover types. (3) Across the study area, the main land cover types such as forest and water bodies were the most consistent across the three product species, while the grassland, shrubland, and bareland were lower. All products showed high accuracy in homogeneous areas, with local accuracy varied in other areas, especially at high altitudes in the central and western regions. Therefore, land cover users cannot use these products directly when conducting relevant studies in rocky desertification areas, as their use may introduce serious errors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Grantham Institute briefing paper 28, 2019. https://www.imperial.ac.uk/media/imperial-college/grantham-institute/public/publications/briefing-papers/BECCS-deployment---a-reality-check.pdf Google Scholar Google Preview OpenURL Placeholder Text WorldCat COPAC 15 Anderson K, Peters G. The trouble with negative emissions. 2018. https://www.ipcc.ch/sr15/ Google Scholar Google Preview OpenURL Placeholder Text WorldCat COPAC 3 Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services. The UN General Assembly in September 2021 will bring countries together at a critical time for marshalling collective action to tackle the global environmental crisis. [Extracted from the article]

Soil wind erosion is the main cause of land degradation in arid and semi-arid areas in northern China, which is mainly affected by surface type, climate and so on. Strong soil wind-erosion will not only accelerate regional desertification and influence the quality of human life, but also cause serious ecological and environmental problems. Since the 2000 s, our country has gradually strengthened the control of land desertification and carried out a series of sand control works, which effectively improved the overall ecological environment of the sandy land. But in recent years, there are some common phenomenon that extensive grassland and brushland was turned into cultivated land in the southeast and southwest of Mu Us sandy land. However, in the dry and windy winter or spring, these new reclaimation land is usually so exposed that it is vulnerable to suffer from strong wind erosion. Therefore, it is great significance to study the characteristics of soil wind erosion in new reclaimation land and find out the control methods. Based on the above question, this paper selected the southern part of Mu Us sandy land (38°05′27″-38°13′58″N, 107°24′28″-107°37′30″E) as the research area, as well as set up 5 observation points on different surfaces, which were represented respectively by A, B, C, D and E. Point A was on the brushland, point B was on the middle of the grassland, and other three points were respectively on different parts of the cultivated land. On the day with strong wind activity, 12 groups simultaneous observation of wind and sand were made at these 5 points (A, B, C, D, E), with each observation time at least 20 minutes. After these observations, the material of the sand samplers were weighed with an electronic balance of 1/1 000, and the material of surface and sand samplers on cultivated land were analyzed by Mastersizer2000 Laser Particle Size Analyzer. The results showed that the soil wind erosion intensity increased exponentially after grassland and shrubland were cultivated; on cultivated land, with the increase of height, the sediment transport rate decreases with exponential function within 0-10 cm height and power function within 10-20 cm height. Due to the height of the sand collector used in this paper is 20cm, lower than the height of the sand flow layer. In order to obtain the total sediment transport rate of the surface of the cultivated land, this paper must calculate it through the function simulation obtained from the above result. After calculating the total sediment transport rate, fitting it with the wind speed. We found that the total sediment transport rate has a good power function relationship with the wind speed in the cultivated land with sufficient erodibility particles. Based on the formula of the relationship between wind speed and total sediment transport rate, as well as the wind speed data of the meteorological stations in the region, the wind erosion modulus of the new reclaimation land can be preliminarily calculated. The result shows that the wind erosion modulus of the new reclaimed land is 9 657 t/(km2·a). Through the results obtained in this paper, combined with the former research results, this paper argues that the emergence of new reclaimed land has an important impact on regional desertification, and its area should be used as an important index when evaluating regional desertification. Meanwhile, Controlling cultivated land area, establishing windbreak and sand fixation forest, as well as retaining stubble at a certain height can effectively control soil wind erosion in newly reclaimed land. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The concept of landscape degradation interprets the process in landscape ecological sense, i.e. the degradation of one landscape forming factor leads to the degradation of the whole landscape. The consequence is a persistent decline in land productivity and in the provision of other ecosystem services. Global environmental change is driven mainly by human influence in the Anthropocene with an exponentially growing significance in time. Global environmental processes are very much interrelated. Because of population growth more food, fibre, clean water, energy etc. will be needed and there are two ways to achieve this, either to gain new areas for cultivation by changing present land use or to intensify cultivation in the areas with the best conditions for cultivation. Deforestation and forest degradation are dealt with in detail in the paper. The introduction of soil degradation processes follows the system given in the EEA Environmental Assessment Report (2003). The effect of landscape degradation on ecosystem services is well explained by the fact that approximately 20 per cent of the Earth's vegetated surface shows persistent declining trends in productivity, mainly as a result of land/water use and management practices (UNCCD 2017). Landscape degradation processes of Hungary are discussed in the paper, including sheet, gully and wind erosion, soil sealing, salinization, physical degradation, landslides, desertification. An estimation of the aesthetical value of the landscape is provided as well concluding that the surface of the country represents a relatively high aesthetical value. The main conclusion is that Hungarian landscapes are well maintained and they belong to the most precious European landscapes. It should be added that all degradation processes represent important environmental problems to be combatted on the basis of a well-established policy making. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]