Suchergebnisse

1. Opening session. Why science is needed for the culture of the third millennium - The motor for progress / Antonino Zichichi. Acceptance remarks on receiving the 2009 Gian Carlo Wick gold medal award / Nicholas P. Samios. Glacial retreat and its impact in Tibetan plateau under global warming / Honglie Sun. Climate stabilization on the basis of geo-engineering technologies / Yuri Antonovitch Izrael. Modeling forest ecosystems, their response to and interaction with global climate change / Herman H. Shugart. Forest policies, carbon sequestration and biodiversity protection / Jan Szyszko. Avoiding disaster : Book presentation / Henning Wegener and William Barletta -- 2. Information security focus : Cyber conflicts and cyber stability - finding a path to cyper peace. Cyber conflict vs. cyber stability : Finding a path to cyber peace / Henning Wegener. Advancing the global cybersecurity agenda and promoting cyberstability globally / Hamadoun I. Toure. Bridging the global gaps in cyber security / Mohd Noor Amin. Cyber war vs. cyber stability / Jody R. Westby. Cyber conflict vs. cyber security : Finding a path to peace / John. G. Grimes. Information security, ensembles of experts / Rick Wesson. Cyber conflict vs. cyber stability : EU and multi-national collaboration / Jacques Bus. Erice declaration on principles for cyber stability and cyber peace / Jody Westby and William Barletta -- 3. Pollution focus : Integrating environmental health research and chemical innovation. Fomenting new opportunities to protect human health / John Peterson Myers. Green chemistry : A necessary step to a sustainable future / John C. Warner. Health impact of environmental chemicals : Need for green chemistry / Jerrold J. Heindel. Moving the chemical enterprise toward sustainability : Key issues / Terry Collins -- 4. Energy & climate focus : Essential technologies for moderating climate change and improving energy security. Balancing perspectives on energy supply, economics, and the environment / Carl O. Bauer. The outlook for power plant CO[symbol] capture / Edward S. Rubin. Making rapid transition to an energy system centered on energy efficiency and renewables possible / Wolfgang Eichhammer. Beyond emerging low-carbon technologies to face climate change? / Giorgio Simbolotti. Institutions for developing new climate solutions / Lee Lane, W. David Montgomery and Anne E. Smith. Moderating climate change by limiting emissions of both short- and long-lived greenhouse gases / Michael C. MacCracken. Current status of technology for collection of uranium from seawater / Masao Tamada. An explanation of oil peaking / Roger W. Bentley. The future of global oil supply : Understanding the building blocks / Peter Jackson. The importance of technology - The constant wild card / Rodney F. Nelson. Recent scientific development in Taiwan in response to global climate change / Maw-Kuen Wu -- 5. Climate focus : Global warming and greenhouse gases. Exponential analysis in the problem of the assessment of the contribution of greenhouse gases in global warming / Mikhail J. Antonovsky -- 6. Energy, climate, pollution and limits of development focus : Advanced technologies and strategies in China for meeting the energy, environment and economy predicament in a greenhouse constrained society. Myths and realities about energy and energy-related CO[energy] emissions in China / Mark D. Levine. Technologies and policies for the transition to low carbon energy system in China / Zhang Xiliang. Assessment of CO[symbol] storage potential in oil/gas-bearing reservoirs in Songliao Basin of China / Mingyuan Li. Carbon cycle in Karst processes / Yuan Daoxian. Bioenergy in China : A grand challenge for economic and environmental sustainability / Jie Zhuang and Gui-Rui Yu. Screening for climate change adaptation : Water problem, impact and challenges in China / Jun Xia -- 7. Climate and data focus : Significant climate uncertainties addressed by satellites. NASA satellite observations for climate research and applications for public health / John A. Haynes. Climate insights from monitoring solar energy output / Judit M. Pap -- 8. Climate & clouds focus : Sensitivity of climate to additional CO[symbol] as indicated by water cycle feedback issues. A natural limit to anthropogenic global warming / William Kininmonth. On the observational determination of climate sensitivity and its implications / Richard S. Lindzen and Yong-Sang Choi. Two basic problems of simulating climate feedbacks / Garth W. Paltridge -- 9. Climate without computer simulation focus : Mathematics, physics, and climate. What is the climate change signal? / Kyle L. Swanson. A key open question of climate forecasting / Christopher Essex -- 10. Climate and health focus : Windblown dust. Medical geology : Dust exposure and potential health risks in the Middle East / Mark B. Lyles. Climate change and climate systems influence and control the atmospheric dispersion of desert dust : Implications for human health / Dale Griffin -- 11. Science & technology focus : WMD proliferation - energy of the future - mathematics & democracy. Remote detection with particle beams / Gregory Canavan. Exploring the Italian navigator's new world : Toward economic,full-scale, low-carbon, conveniently-available, proliferation - robust, renewable energy resources / Lowell Wood. The Mathematics of Democracy in South Asia / K. C. Sivaramakrishnan -- 12. WFS general meeting PMP reports - debate and conclusions. Permanent monitoring panel on motivations for terrorism / Lord John Alderdice. AIDS and infectious diseases PMP / Franco M. Buonaguro. Mother and child PMP / Nathalie Charpak. Permanent monitoring panel on limits of development / Christopher D. Ellis. Pollution permanent monitoring panel : Annual report / Lorne Everett. Multinational repositories : Recent developments and 2010 session and workshop proposals / Charles McCombie. Energy PMP report / William Fulkerson ... [et al.]. Report of the permanent monitoring panel for the mitigation of terrorist acts : PMP-MTA / Sally Leivesley. Permanent monitoring panel on climate activity report / William A. Sprigg. Permanent monitoring panel on information security report from the co-chairs / Henning Wegener and Jody R. Westby -- 13. Information security panel meeting. Erice declaration on principles for cyber stability and cyber peace / World Federation of Scientists : Permanent monitoring panel on information security. Top cyber security problems that need resolution to address communications / World Federation of Scientists : Permanent monitoring panel on information security. Quest for cyber peace / World Federation of Scientists : Permanent monitoring panel on information security -- 14. Limits of development panel meeting. About questions to be discussed on occasion of the 2009 Erice meeting of the PMP limits of development : The situation in Argentina / Juan Manuel Borthagaray and Andres Borthagaray. Sustainable development in Mexico : Facing the multi-headed hydra / Alberto Gonzalez-Pozo -- 15. Mitigation of terrorist attacks meeting. Permanent Monitoring Panel - Mitigation of Terrorist Acts (MPM-MTA) workshop agenda / Richard Wilson. Development of CBRN event mitigation / Friedrich Steinhausler. One science for CBRN mitigation / Annette L. Sobel. The need for a corps of radiation workers for immediate assignment / Richard Wilson. India's response to the prospect of WMD terrorism / Ramamurti Rajaraman. Politization in the process of international cooperation to mitigate nuclear terrorism : Some dubious results / Vasily Krivokhizha. Immediate communications in the CBRN environment / Robert V. Duncan. Immediate evaluation of radiological and nuclear attacks / Richard L. Garwin. Establishment of a scientifically-informed rapid response system / Richard Wilson -- 16. Energy panel meeting. Status of ITER broader approach activities / Akira Miyahara. Topics of energy research in Japan / Akira Miyahara.

Background:Integrated steelmaking is known to emit coarse airborne 'nuisance' dust (10–100 μm) to the produc‑tion site and in the local environs. We present a method to quantitatively analyse the provenance, mineralogical and chemical attributes of the constituent particles in nuisance dust related to the integrated steelworks of Tata Steel, IJmuiden, the Netherlands. The dust is characterised per particle, using scanning electron microscopy with energy‑dispersive spectrometry (SEM–EDS) microanalysis, and in bulk with quantitative X‑ray diffraction (XRD) analysis. Based on mineralogical characteristics, particles in the dust are sorted into populations that can be related in detail to industrial processes and subsequent atmospheric weathering influence. The method is illustrated by application to a nuisance dust complaint sample from the neighbouring town Wijk aan Zee containing a large contribution of several dust sources from the integrated steelworks.Results:Besides a background contribution from urban and natural dust, diverse sources from the integrated steel‑works are identified in the nuisance dust sample, derived from coke‑making, iron‑ore agglomeration processes and blast furnace ironmaking, steelmaking slag processing, process fluxes, as well as steelmaking refractory materials. The most voluminous of these in the sample are directly verified by comparison with a set of reference source materi‑als. The abundances, mineralogical and chemical attributes of the various dust particle populations in the sample are quantitatively examined including, specifically, the occurrence of the potentially toxic elements Mn and V. These elements occur with highest concentrations in dust derived from steelmaking converter slag: V is housed in dilute form (solid solution) in the phases di‑calcium silicate and brownmillerite, and Mn chiefly in Mg–Fe‑oxide (Mg‑wustite ((Mg,Mn,Fe)O) and its oxidation product ((Mg,Mn,Fe)(Fe,Mn)2O4)).Conclusions:By treating nuisance dust as a particulate, multi‑phase, multi‑source material, the outlined method pro‑vides crucial information for toxicological evaluation and for mitigation of emissions, which is not obtainable by bulk chemical analyses alone. It also helps address the lack of adequate monitoring options for deposits of nuisance dust from integrated steel production, necessary to evaluate the relationship between deposition and monitored emis‑sions that are regulated by the European Industrial Emissions Directive and by local permits based on this legislation.

Climate warming-related drought could become a major driver of large-scale forest dieback. However, little is known about how past management legacies modulate the climate-growth responses during recent dieback episodes in central European oak forests. Here, we examine the role played by past management –unmanaged old-growth vs. managed forests– in recent tree mortality events occurring in Quercus petraea (Matt.) Liebl. stands across large areas of western Romania. We analyze how stand structure (tree size, competition) and climatic factors (drought, temperature and precipitation) drive tree radial growth patterns in neighboring standing dead and living trees. We analyzed basal area increments (BAI) trends, past management legacies and climate- and drought-growth relationships during the 20th century to distinguish the roles and interactions on recent warming-induced dieback. We observed that temperature rises and changes in atmospheric water demand during growing season let to increasing drought stress during the late 20th century affecting both managed and unmanaged forests. Dead trees from old-growth and managed forests showed lower growth than living trees after dieback onset. In both forests, dead and living trees displayed divergent growth patterns after dry 1980s, indicating that dieback was triggered by severe extreme conditions. Dead trees from managed stands experienced significant stronger growth reductions after 1980s though they experienced less tree-to-tree competition than dead trees in old-growth forest. High stand density negatively drove growth and enhanced climate sensitivity in old-growth stands. Competition acted synergistically with climate warming and drought causing tree mortality regardless of the management legacies in of Q. petraea forests. Our retrospective assessment of growth rates in relation with climate and structure changes offers valuable information for further forest conservation and management decisions of Q. petraea forests. These findings highlight the importance of past uses legacies driving recent forest dieback in temperate oak forests, making them more vulnerable under forecasted climate-warming related droughts in central Europe. ; Nemoral Forests under Climate Extremes (NEMKLIM Project, grant number 3517861300), German Federal Agency for Nature Conservation (Bundesamt für Naturschutz,BfN), German Federal Ministry for the Environment, Nature Conservation and Nuclear Safety, Germany, project PN 19070506, Romanian National Authority from Scientific Research and Innovation, Romanian Ministry of Education and Research, CNCS-UEFISCDI, project number PN-III-P4-ID-PCE-2020- 2696, within PNCDI III. projects VUL-BOS project (UPO-1263216 and PinCaR (UHU-1266324), FEDER Funds, Andalusia Regional Government, Consejería de Economía, Conocimiento, Empresas y Universidad 2014-2020), project LESENS (RTI2018-096884-B-C33), Spanish Ministry of Science, Innovation and Universities. ; This work was supported by NEMKLIM project: Nemoral Forests under Climate Extremes (NEMKLIM Project, grant number 3517861300), financed by the German Federal Agency for Nature Conservation (Bundesamt für Naturschutz,BfN) and the German Federal Ministry for the Environment, Nature Conservation and Nuclear Safety, Germany and by project PN 19070506 financed by Romanian National Authority from Scientific Research and Innovation. I.C. Petritan was supported by a grant of the Romanian Ministry of Education and Research, CNCS-UEFISCDI, project number PN-III-P4-ID-PCE-2020- 2696, within PNCDI III. R. S ´anchez-Salguero was supported by VUL-BOS project (UPO-1263216, FEDER Funds, Andalusia Regional Government, Consejería de Economía, Conocimiento, Empresas y Universidad 2014-2020) and LESENS (RTI2018-096884-B-C33) project from the Spanish Ministry of Science, Innovation and Universities. A. Hevia was supported by PinCaR project (UHU-1266324, FEDER Funds, Andalusia Regional Government, Consejería de Economía, Conocimiento, Empresas y Universidad 2014-2020). We are also grateful to Lucian Toiu, Nicu Tudose, George Sarbu and Gheorghe Stefan for help in collecting field data. We appreciate the permission and logistic support given by staff of the Barzava and Codrii Beiusului si Sfanta Maria Forest Districts, we are grateful especially to eng. Gheorghe Marc and eng. Jeno Ferko. The authors declare no conflicts of interest.

Open Access article, published by EDP Sciences, under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. ; Context. The tenuous nitrogen (N2) atmosphere on Pluto undergoes strong seasonal effects due to high obliquity and orbital eccentricity, and has recently (July 2015) been observed by the New Horizons spacecraft. Aims. The main goals of this study are (i) to construct a well calibrated record of the seasonal evolution of surface pressure on Pluto and (ii) to constrain the structure of the lower atmosphere using a central flash observed in 2015. Methods. Eleven stellar occultations by Pluto observed between 2002 and 2016 are used to retrieve atmospheric profiles (density, pressure, temperature) between altitude levels of ∼5 and ∼380 km (i.e. pressures from ∼10 μbar to 10 nbar). Results. (i) Pressure has suffered a monotonic increase from 1988 to 2016, that is compared to a seasonal volatile transport model, from which tight constraints on a combination of albedo and emissivity of N2 ice are derived. (ii) A central flash observed on 2015 June 29 is consistent with New Horizons REX profiles, provided that (a) large diurnal temperature variations (not expected by current models) occur over Sputnik Planitia; and/or (b) hazes with tangential optical depth of ∼0.3 are present at 4-7 km altitude levels; and/or (c) the nominal REX density values are overestimated by an implausibly large factor of ∼20%; and/or (d) higher terrains block part of the flash in the Charon facing hemisphere.© E. Meza et al. 2019 ; The work leading to these results has received funding from the European Research Council under the European Community's H2020 2014-2020 ERC Grant Agreement no 669416 >Lucky Star>. E.M. thanks support from Concytec-Fondecyt-PE and GA, FC-UNI for providing support during the 2012 July 18 occultation. B.S. thanks S. Para for partly supporting this research though a donation, J. P. Beaulieu for helping us accessing to the Hobart Observatory facilities and B. Warner, B. L. Gary, C. Erickson, H. Reitsema, L. Albert, P. J. Merritt, T. Hall, W. J. Romanishin, Y. J. Choi for providing data during the 2007 March 18 occultation. M.A. thanks CNPq (Grants 427700/2018-3, 310683/2017-3 and 473002/2013-2) and FAPERJ (Grant E-26/111.488/2013). J.L.O. thanks support from grant AYA2017-89637-R. P.S.S. acknowledges financial support from the European Union's Horizon 2020 Research and Innovation Programme, under Grant Agreement no 687378, as part of the project > Small Bodies Near and Far> (SBNAF). J.L.O., R.D., P.S.S. and N.M. acknowledge financial support from the State Agency for Research of the Spanish MCIU through the > Center of Excellence Severo Ochoa> award for the Instituto de Astrofisica de Andalucia (SEV-2017-0709). F.B.R. acknowledges CNPq support process 309578/2017-5. G.B.R. thanks support from the grant CAPES-FAPERJ/PAPDRJ (E26/203.173/2016). J.I.B.C. acknowledges CNPq grant 308150/2016-3. R.V.M. thanks the grants: CNPq-304544/2017-5, 401903/2016-8, and Faperj: PAPDRJ-45/2013 and E-26/203.026/2015. B.M. thanks the CAPES/Cofecub-394/2016-05 grant and CAPES/Brazil -Finance Code 001. B.M. and A.R.G.J. were financed in part by the Coordenacao de Aperfeicoamento de Pessoal de Nivel Superior -Brasil (CAPES) -Finance Code 001. TRAPPIST-North is a project funded by the University of Liege, in collaboration with Cadi Ayyad University of Marrakech (Morocco). TRAPPIST-South is a project funded by the Belgian Fonds (National) de la Recherche Scientifique (F.R.S.-FNRS) under grant FRFC 2.5.594.09. F, with the participation of the Swiss National Science Foundation (FNS/SNSF). VSD, SPL, TRM and ULTRACAM are all supported by the STFC. K.G. acknowledges help from the team of Archenhold-Observatory, Berlin, and A. R. thanks G. Roman (Granada) for help during the observation of the 2016 July 19 occultation. A.J.C.T. acknowledges support from the Spanish Ministry Project AYA2015-71718-R (including EU funds). ; Peer Reviewed

Supplementary material associated with this article can be found, in the online version, at 10.1016/j.icarus.2018.04.009. ; The file associated with this record is under embargo until 12 months after publication, in accordance with the publisher's self-archiving policy. The full text may be available through the publisher links provided above. ; We present observations of Neptune taken in H-(1.4–1.8 µm) and K'-(2.0–2.4 µm) bands on the nights of July 3, 2013 and August 20, 2014 from the 10-m W.M. Keck II Telescope using NIRC2 coupled to the Adaptive Optics (AO) system. We track the positions of ∼100 bright atmospheric features over a 4–5 h window on each night to derive zonal velocities and wind profiles. Our results deviate from the smooth Voyager zonal wind profile from Sromovsky et al. (1993), often by 100–200 m/s, and often by 3–10 times their estimated uncertainties. Besides what appears to be a random dispersion, probably due to a mix of unaccounted for measurement errors, eddy motions, vertical wind shear, and wave-generated features that do not follow the mass flow, there is also a systematic deviation that is wavelength dependent. The H-band profile is best described with a 73–106 m/s shift towards the east for a retrograde flow (i.e., a lessening of the retrograding velocities) from the Voyager profile at the equator. The K'-band profile is consistent with Voyager on both nights. Comparing H and K' contribution functions and K'/H intensities suggests equatorial H-band features are, on average, deeper than K'-band features. The H-band equatorial features also have greater eastward (less negative) velocities than K'-band features. Differences in zonal wind speed with depth at constant latitude and time imply vertical wind shear. Assuming the average variations in the zonal wind profiles result from wind shear over 3–5 scale heights, we predict vertical wind shears between −1.0 and −2.2 m/(s km) at the equator (increasing with height). The standard thermal wind equation and meridional thermal profile for Neptune given by Voyager/IRIS spectra predict wind shear of the wrong sign relative to the observations. We consider two effects that reconcile this inconsistency. First, we calculate the meridional temperature gradients at pressures outside the Voyager/IRIS narrow sensitivity window required to match our predicted wind shears. Second, we generalize to a thermal wind equation that considers global methane variations and re-derive the temperature structure needed to match the observed wind shear. If methane is uniformly distributed or weakly varying, the equator must be 2–15 K cooler than the mid latitudes below 1 bar. If methane is strongly varying, the equator can be 2–3 K warmer than the mid latitudes below 1 bar, qualitatively consistent with observed temperature contrasts. These findings may imply a stacked-celled circulation pattern in Neptune's troposphere and lower stratosphere. ; The data presented were obtained at the W.M. Keck Observatory, which is operated as a scientific partnership among the California Institute of Technology, the University of California and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. The Observatory was made possible by the generous financial support of the W.M. Keck Foundation. This work has been supported in part by the National Science Foundation, NSF Grant AST-0908575 and AST-1615004 to UC Berkeley and by NASA Headquarters: under the NASA Earth and Space Science Fellowship program Grant NNX16AP12H to UC Berkeley, and Grant NNX23AG56G under NASA Planetary Atmospheres to UC Berkeley. LNF was supported by a Royal Society Research Fellowship and European Research Council Consolidator Grant (under the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme, grant agreement No. 723890) at the University of Leicester. The authors wish to recognize and acknowledge the very significant cultural role and reverence that the summit of Mauna Kea has always had within the indigenous Hawaiian community. We are most fortunate to conduct observations from this mountain. ; Peer-reviewed ; Post-print

11 pages, 6 figures, supplementary information https://doi.org/10.1038/s41612-021-00188-5.-- Data availability; The data generated and analyzed during the current study are available from the corresponding author YRR on reasonable request ; Atlantic multidecadal variability (AMV) has been linked to the observed slowdown of global warming over 1998–2012 through its impact on the tropical Pacific. Given the global importance of tropical Pacific variability, better understanding this Atlantic–Pacific teleconnection is key for improving climate predictions, but the robustness and strength of this link are uncertain. Analyzing a multi-model set of sensitivity experiments, we find that models differ by a factor of 10 in simulating the amplitude of the Equatorial Pacific cooling response to observed AMV warming. The inter-model spread is mainly driven by different amounts of moist static energy injection from the tropical Atlantic surface into the upper troposphere. We reduce this inter-model uncertainty by analytically correcting models for their mean precipitation biases and we quantify that, following an observed 0.26 °C AMV warming, the equatorial Pacific cools by 0.11 °C with an inter-model standard deviation of 0.03 °C ; Y.R.-R. was founded by the European Union's Horizon 2020 Research and Innovation Program in the framework of the Marie Skłodowska-Curie grant INADEC (Grant agreement 800154). E.M.-C. acknowledges funding from the European Commission's Horizon 2020 projects PRIMAVERA (Grant Agreement 641727). X.L. has received funding from the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation program under the Marie Skłodowska-Curie grant agreement H2020-MSCA-COFUND-2016-754433. A.B. and D.N. acknowledge funding from the European Commission's Horizon 2020 project EUCP (Grant agreement 776613). F.C. and G.D. were supported by the US National Science Foundation (NSF) under the Collaborative Research EaSM2 Grant OCE-1243015 to NCAR and by the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Climate Program Office under the Climate Variability and Predictability Program Grant NA13OAR4310138. NCAR is a major facility sponsored by the US NSF under Cooperative Agreement 1852977. [.] R.E., N.D., L.H., and D.S. were supported by the Met Office Hadley Center 522 Climate Program funded by BEIS and Defra and by the European Commission Horizon 2020 EUCP 523 project (GA 776613). J.L.-P. was funded by the European Union's Horizon 2020 Research and Innovation Program in the framework of the PRIMAVERA project (Grant Agreement 641727). J.R. and D.H. were funded by NERC via NCAS and the ACSIS project (NE/N018001/1), and JR was also funded by the NERC SMURPHS project (NE/N006054/1). M.M.-R. was funded by the European Union's Horizon 2020 Research and Innovation Program in the framework of the Marie Skłodowska-Curie grant FESTIVAL (Grant agreement 797236). E.T. has received funding from the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation program under the Marie Skłodowska-Curie grant agreement No. 748750 (SPFireSD project) ; With the funding support of the 'Severo Ochoa Centre of Excellence' accreditation (CEX2019-000928-S), of the Spanish Research Agency (AEI) ; Peer reviewed

The authors thank the FEDER program for the instrumentation used in this work and the University of Granada for supporting this study through the Excellence Units Program "Plan Propio. Programa23 Convocatoria 2017". CIMEL Calibration was performed at the AERONET-EUROPE calibration center, supported by ACTRIS. We also express our gratitude to the developers of the LIRIC algorithm and software. The authors thank Sierra Nevada National Park for support in the maintenance of the Sun-sky photometer station at Cerro Poyos. Maria J. Granados-Muñoz is funded by a Maria Sklodowska-Curie IF under grant agreement no. 796539. Juan Antonio Bravo-Aranda and Antonio Valenzuela received funding from the Marie Sklodowska-Curie Action Cofund 2016 EU project Athenea3i under grant agreement no. 754446. Jose Antonio Benavent-Oltra is funded by the University of Granada through "Plan Propio. Programa 7, Convocatoria 2019". This work was also supported by the Ambizione program of the Swiss National Science Foundation (project no. PZ00P2 168114). ; This work evaluates the Lidar-Radiometer Inversion Code (LIRIC) using sun-sky photometers located at different altitudes in the same atmospheric column. Measurements were acquired during an intensive observational period in summer 2012 at Aerosols, Clouds, and Trace gases Research InfraStructure Network (ACTRIS)/Aerosol Robotic Network (AERONET) Granada (GRA; 37.16◦N, 3.61◦W, 680 m above sea level (a.s.l.)) and Cerro Poyos (CP; 37.11◦N, 3.49◦W, 1820 m a.s.l.) sites. Both stations operated AERONET sun-photometry, with an additional lidar system operating at Granada station. The extended database of simultaneous lidar and sun-photometry measurements from this study allowed the statistical analysis of vertically resolved microphysical properties retrieved with LIRIC, with 70% of the analyzed cases corresponding to mineral dust. Consequently, volume concentration values were 46 µm3 /cm3 on average, with a value of ~30 µm3 /cm3 corresponding to the coarse spheroid mode and concentrations below 10 µm3 /cm3 for the fine and coarse spherical modes. According to the microphysical properties' profiles, aerosol particles reached altitudes up to 6000 m a.s.l., as observed in previous studies over the same region. Results obtained from comparing the LIRIC retrievals from GRA and from CP revealed good agreement between both stations with differences within the expected uncertainties associated with LIRIC (15%). However, larger discrepancies were found for 10% of the cases, mostly due to the incomplete overlap of the lidar signal and/or to the influence of different aerosol layers advected from the local origin located between both stations, which is particularly important in cases of low aerosol loads. Nevertheless, the results presented here demonstrate the robustness and self-consistency of LIRIC and consequently its applicability to large databases such as those derived from ACTRIS-European Aerosol Research Lidar Network (EARLINET) observations. ; This work was supported by the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness through projects CGL2016-81092-R, and CGL2017-83538-C3-1-R; the Excellence network CGL2017-90884-REDT; by the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation program through ACTRIS project (grant agreement n. 654169).

Soil degradation by water is a serious environmental problem worldwide, with specific climatic factors being the major causes. We investigated the relationships between synoptic atmospheric patterns (i.e. weather types, WTs) and runoff, erosion and sediment yield throughout the Mediterranean basin by analyzing a large database of natural rainfall events at 68 research sites in 9 countries. Principal Component Analysis (PCA) was used to identify spatial relationships of the different WTs including three hydro-sedimentary variables: rainfall, runoff, and sediment yield (SY, used to refer to both soil erosion measured at plot scale and sediment yield registered at catchment scale). The results indicated 4 spatial classes of rainfall and runoff: (a) northern sites dependent on North (N) and North West (NW) flows; (b) eastern sites dependent on E and NE flows; (c) southern sites dependent on S and SE flows; and, finally, (d) western sites dependent on W and SW flows. Conversely, three spatial classes are identified for SY characterized by: (a) N and NE flows in northern sites (b) E flows in eastern sites, and (c) W and SW flows in western sites. Most of the rainfall, runoff and SY occurred during a small number of daily events, and just a few WTs accounted for large percentages of the total. Our results confirm that characterization by WT improves understanding of the general conditions under which runoff and SY occur, and provides useful information for understanding the spatial variability of runoff, and SY throughout the Mediterranean basin. The approach used here could be useful to aid of the design of regional water management and soil conservation measures. ; This research was supported by projects funded by the MINECO-FEDER: CGL2014-52135-C3-3-R, CGL2014-59946-R, CGL2015-65569-R, CGL2015-64284-C2-2-R, and PCIN-2017-061/AEI. When this manuscript was first submitted Estela Nadal-Romero and Damià Vericat received a "Ramón y Cajal" postdoctoral contract (RYC-2013-14371 and RYC‐2010‐06264, Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness, MEC). Damià Vericat is now a Serra Húnter Fellow at the University of Lleida. María Fernández-Raga received a "José Castillejo" postdoctoral grant (Spanish Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports). Carla Ferreira was supported by a post-doctoral research grant from the Portuguese Science and Technology Foundation (SFRH/BPD/120093/2016). Mariano Moreno-de las Heras received a Juan de la Cierva postdoctoral contract (IJCI-2015-26463) from the MEC. José Andrés López-Tarazón received a Vicenç Mut postdoctoral fellowship from the Autonomous Balearic Government (CAIB PD/038/2016). José Andrés López-Tarazón and Ramon Batalla also acknowledge the Secretariat for Universities and Research of the Department of the Economy and Knowledge of the Autonomous Government of Catalonia for supporting the Consolidated Research Group 2014 SGR 645 (RIUS- Fluvial Dynamics Research Group), and the CERCA Programme. This paper has benefited from the Lab and Field Data Pool created within the framework of the COST action CONNECTEUR (ES1306).

The conversion of methane into higher molecular weight hydrocarbons of greater added value has emerged as one of the grand challenges of the 21st century. The non-oxidative methane dehydroaromatization (hereafter MDA) reaction is a promising methane valorisation reaction since it transforms methane into added-value aromatics and olefins, namely benzene, naphthalene and ethylene. Molybdenum-promoted ZSM-5 zeolite has proven to be one of the most effective catalysts for MDA providing a shape-selective environment for the conversion of methane into benzene. However, one of the principle disadvantages of using aluminosilicates in the presence of methane is that the catalyst suffers from rapid deactivation induced by coke formation, which ultimately leads to a decrease in activity and aromatics selectivity, making the process unsuitable for large-scale industrial applications. Better control of the metal dispersion on the surface of the aluminosilicate supports represents a crucial factor to partially suppress catalyst coking and improve stability. Here we show how different molecular polyoxomolybdate (POM) anions can be used as alternative Mo precursors to conventional Mo salts for the preparation of catalysts for the MDA reaction. Molecular dynamics simulations and experimental testing were conducted to characterize the interphase interactions between polyoxomolybdates and zeolite surfaces at the atomistic level and to evaluate the MDA performance of different POM-based catalysts supported on ZSM-5 and MCM-22, respectively. The catalysts prepared using hexamolybdate anions, [Mo6O19]2−, were found to be more active and selective towards benzene than those employing the commercial heptamolybdate, [Mo7O24]6−. The Mo loading and dispersion of MoOx species were found to be the key factors leading to enhanced catalytic stability on ZSM-5 and MCM-22-based supports for MDA where the 5% Mo6/MCM-22 catalyst provided a constant aromatics yield above 7% for more than 18 hours time-on stream operating at 700 °C with a diluted methane flow under atmospheric pressure. The zeolitic catalysts prepared with the Mo6 precursor were found to be amongst the most promising MDA catalysts in the literature and the results of this study pave the way for the selection and use of different POMs as innovative metal precursors to formulate new catalysts and further improve the MDA reaction process. ; Financial support from the European Union's Horizon 2020 Research and Innovation Programme (ADREM project – Grant Agreement No. 680777) is gratefully acknowledged. The microscopy measurements were conducted at the Laboratorio de Microscopias Avanzadas, Instituto de Nanociencia de Aragon, Universidad de Zaragoza, Spain. The synthesis of the materials has been performed at the Platform of Production of Biomaterials and Nanoparticles of the NANOBIOSIS ICTS, more specifically at the Nanoparticle Synthesis Unit of the CIBER in BioEngineering, Biomaterials & Nanomedicine (CIBER-BBN). JMP thanks the Spanish Ministry of Science (CTQ2017-87269-P), the Generalitat de Catalunya (2017SGR629) and the URV for support. JMP also thanks the ICREA foundation for an ICREA ACADEMIA award. ; Peer reviewed

Nitrogen pollution in marine waters is directly tied to human development – including agricultural runoff, atmospheric deposition, and urban wastewater effluents. After more than a century of urbanization, Hong Kong faces a major challenge in mitigating marine pollution, particularly nitrogen. Indeed, nitrogen pollution may be one of the primary causes of benthic ecosystem decline as evidenced by a contraction in the historical distribution of corals and seagrasses. Such ecosystems provide vital ecosystem services, not limited to nursery grounds for economically important fisheries. While the Hong Kong Government (HK Environmental Protection Department) has established long-term monitoring of marine nitrogen concentrations, the data obtained on the size of the total nitrogen pool does not indicate the proportion of which is derived from human activities. Stable isotope analysis of nitrogen (δ15N) can provide more accurate information on the source of nitrogen not only in the receiving environment but also in the marine and benthic organisms present. This project critically examines Hong Kong's nitrogen sources from sewage effluents using stable isotope analysis. Objectives were to investigate (1) the δ15N of sewage effluents sampled across Hong Kong, Kowloon, New Territories, Lantau and Outlying Islands (2) the differences in δ15N across sewage treatment type and (3) the differences in δ15N between the wet and dry seasons with the aim of developing a new approach for detecting and mapping sewage impacts in Hong Kong. Through a 6-month sampling effort across 18 sewage treatment facilities, this study shows that 70% of δ15N values obtained from the sewage effluents were characteristically enriched (δ15N values up to 205 ‰) when compared with naturally occurring nitrogen sources in the biosphere (I10‰ < δ15N < 10‰). Overall, δ15N was more variable in plants with preliminary treatment and chemically enhanced primary treatment (CEPT) than in plants with primary, secondary or tertiary treatment. The mean daily flow rate explained 75.7% of the observed variability in δ15N values of preliminary treatment plants and 85% of the variability in primary treatment plants. This was also the case in plants having CEPT with a negative correlation of 46% between mean daily flow rate and sewage effluent δ15N values. This suggests varying models for the quantity and retention time of wastewater versus δ15N signatures for different treatment types that require further study. Microbial activity by aerobic bacteria and protozoa, ammonia volatilization and the amount of nitrogen present in the effluents are possible causes for δ15N enrichment. Enterococcus counts of three sites sampled indicated that that the municipal sewer system and wastewater treatment plant in Stonecutters Island (56,100 CFU 100 mlI1) and preliminary treatment facilities (57,800 CFU 100 mlI1) in Hong Kong Island are insufficient in preventing bacterial contamination in comparison to US EPA standards for recreational use of coastal marine waters (35 CFU 100 mlI1). These findings indicate that enriched δ15N values directly translate to the presence of anthropogenic inputs and that monitoring δ15N of primary producers is a feasible and important tool for monitoring wastewater management in Hong Kong. ; published_or_final_version ; Environmental Management ; Master ; Master of Science in Environmental Management

River damming is a common way to use river systems to generate hydroelectric power, provide water for irrigation and supply drinking water, and it has been practised for millennia. The number of completed dam projects peaked in North America and Western Europe in the 1960s and 1970s. In the last decades, instead, the hydropower industry moved to build dams in the global south in order to serve growing industries and urban populations. The ongoing growth of the hydropower sector at low latitudes calls for an examination of the political, socio-economic and environmental effects of tropical dams. Despite the many services provided by dams, they affect the river ecosystem in many different ways. Dams disrupt the continuum of rivers by altering their natural hydrological regimes and also create new lentic systems by increasing water residence time. This has cascading effects on the morphology, biogeochemistry and ecology of downstream river environments. Concerning biogeochemistry, dams interrupt the flow of organic carbon, change the nutrient balance and alter oxygen and thermal conditions. Thus, they alter river water quality. Large reservoirs are also potential hotspots for mineralization processes. Thus, reservoirs, especially in the tropics, may be responsible for substantial amounts of greenhouse gas emissions. In recent years, the scientific community started analysing the environmental impacts of large dams in a more holistic manner to better inform stakeholders and decision-makers to find a balance between tapping hydropower potential and sustaining key natural resources. This project investigates the effects of damming on water quality at low latitudes with a specific focus on three water quality parameters: water temperature, dissolved oxygen and carbon dioxide (CO2). Water temperature and dissolved oxygen are key parameters for the survival and reproduction of aquatic species. Water temperature alterations can affect community composition and even trigger the local extinction of species. Low oxygen concentrations alter lifecycle performance, growth capacity, reproductive success and disease vulnerability of fish, whilst hypoxia leads to higher fish mortality. Carbon dioxide, instead, is a greenhouse gas and most of the carbon mineralized in inland waters is released as CO2 to the atmosphere. Major uncertainties remain regarding the consequences of anthropogenic hydrological alterations, especially those stemming from large dams, on carbon emissions. This thesis considers the Zambezi River Basin (southeastern Africa) as a specific case study. The Zambezi River Basin is one of the most dammed African river basins, and many additional dams are already planned or under construction. Among others, the Zambezi River Basin hosts Kariba Dam, which forms the largest artificial lake in the world by volume. Kariba Dam and its hydropower plant are transboundary structures, with management shared between Zambia and Zimbabwe. In general, the transboundary character of water infrastructures complicates the water resources management and thus, serious omissions in the discussion of downstream water quality effects often occur. This specific case study in the Zambezi Basin serves as a starting point to shed some light on the general effects of large dams on water quality at low latitudes. The first study of this thesis presents a global review and synthesis of the effects of river damming on water quality with a special focus on low latitudes. Two physical processes were identified as drivers of most water quality changes: the trapping of sediments and nutrients and the thermal stratification in reservoirs. Analysing the mixing behaviour of the 54 largest low-latitude reservoirs revealed that most, if not all, large low-latitude reservoirs stratify on at least a seasonal basis. Stratification creates density and temperature gradients within the lake water column, facilitating the development of low-oxygen conditions in the deep colder waters. By releasing such water, low-latitude large dams have the potential to impact downstream ecosystems by altering thermal regimes or causing hypoxic stress. The second study of this thesis shows how a detailed statistical analysis of vertical profiles in reservoirs allows generating an assessment tool for water quality alterations downstream of large dams. This finding suggests that designing and maintaining an efficient water quality monitoring of reservoirs is key for their sustainable management. Due to the spatial heterogeneity of water quality in large reservoirs, water quality monitoring should be designed for capturing the temporal dynamics close to outlets of dams in order to predict downstream water quality. In the third study, the alterations of the thermal and oxygen regimes of the Zambezi River downstream of Kariba Dam were quantified by means of a one-dimensional numerical lake model. Results suggest that these alterations depend on the stratification and the water level of the reservoir but also on the management of water withdrawal, thus on the transboundary policies of the dam. Scenarios show that cooperative management of the existing infrastructure of Kariba Dam has the potential to partially mitigate the actual downstream water quality alterations. These results reveal that transboundary dams may offer additional opportunities for optimized management. Moreover, outcomes show that biogeochemical lake models are effective tools to test the effectiveness of such transboundary management scenarios to mitigate downstream water quality alterations. Finally, the last part of the thesis addresses the effects of large dams on the carbon dioxide emission dynamics of inland waters. Monitoring the seasonal and sub-daily fluctuations of water quality properties downstream of Kariba Dam revealed that atmospheric CO2 emissions from the Zambezi River surface downstream of Kariba fluctuate strongly over different timescales. Seasonal changes were driven by reservoir stratification and the accumulation of carbon dioxide in hypolimnetic waters. Sub-daily variability of CO2 emissions, instead, was linked to the hydropeaking resulting from the daily variability in electricity production. Failing to account for these fluctuations in downstream CO2 emissions could lead to errors in the carbon budgeting of hydroelectric reservoirs. Thus, it is critically important to include both limnological seasonality and dam operation at sub-daily time steps in our assessment of carbon budgeting of reservoirs and carbon cycling along the aquatic continuum. This thesis underlines potential environmental drawbacks associated with hydropower, nevertheless recognizing the many benefits of such energy source to societies worldwide. Thus, it aims at inspiring innovative strategies for more sustainable design and management of dams.

Full list of authors: Acharyya, A.; Adam, R.; Adams, C.; Agudo, I.; Aguirre-Santaella, A.; Alfaro, R.; Alfaro, J.; Alispach, C.; Aloisio, R.; Alves Batista, R.; Amati, L.; Ambrosi, G.; Angüner, E. O.; Antonelli, L. A.; Aramo, C.; Araudo, A.; Armstrong, T.; Arqueros, F.; Asano, K.; Ascasíbar, Y. Ashley, M.; Balazs, C.; Ballester, O.; Baquero Larriva, A.; Barbosa Martins, V.; Barkov, M.; Barres de Almeida, U.; Barrio, J. A.; Bastieri, D.; Becerra, J.; Beck, G.; Becker Tjus, J.; Benbow, W.; Benito, M.; Berge, D.; Bernardini, E.; Bernlöhr, K.; Berti, A.; Bertucci, B.; Beshley, V.; Biasuzzi, B.; Biland, A.; Bissaldi, E.; Biteau, J.; Blanch, O.; Blazek, J.; Bocchino, F.; Boisson, C.; Bonneau Arbeletche, L.; Bordas, P.; Bosnjak, Z.; Bottacini, E.; Bozhilov, V.; Bregeon, J.; Brill, A.; Bringmann, T.; Brown, A. M.; Brun, P.; Brun, F.; Bruno, P.; Bulgarelli, A.; Burton, M.; Burtovoi, A.; Buscemi, M.; Cameron, R.; Capasso, M.; Caproni, A.; Capuzzo-Dolcetta, R.; Caraveo, P.; Carosi, R.; Carosi, A.; Casanova, S.; Cascone, E.; Cassol, F.; Catalani, F.; Cauz, D.; Cerruti, M.; Chadwick, P.; Chaty, S.; Chen, A.; Chernyakova, M.; Chiaro, G.; Chiavassa, A.; Chikawa, M.; Chudoba, J.; Çolak, M.; Conforti, V.; Coniglione, R.; Conte, F.; Contreras, J. L.; Coronado-Blazquez, J.; Costa, A.; Costantini, H.; Cotter, G.; Cristofari, P.; D'Aimath, A.; D'Ammando, F.; Damone, L. A.; Daniel, M. K.; Dazzi, F.; De Angelis, A.; De Caprio, V.; de Cássia dos Anjos, R.; de Gouveia Dal Pino, E. M.; De Lotto, B.; De Martino, D.; de Oña Wilhelmi, E.; De Palma, F.; de Souza, V.; Delgado, C.; Delgado Giler, A. G.; della Volpe, D.; Depaoli, D.; Di Girolamo, T.; Di Pierro, F.; Di Venere, L.; Diebold, S.; Dmytriiev, A.; Domínguez, A.; Donini, A.; Doro, M.; Ebr, J.; Eckner, C.; Edwards, T. D. P.; Ekoume, T. R. N.; Elsässer, D.; Evoli, C.; Falceta-Goncalves, D.; Fedorova, E.; Fegan, S.; Feng, Q.; Ferrand, G.; Ferrara, G.; Fiandrini, E.; Fiasson, A.; Filipovic, M.; Fioretti, V.; Fiori, M.; Foffano, L.; Fontaine, G.; Fornieri, O.; Franco, F. J.; Fukami, S.; Fukui, Y.; Gaggero, D.; Galaz, G.; Gammaldi, V.; Garcia, E.; Garczarczyk, M.; Gascon, D.; Gent, A.; Ghalumyan, A.; Gianotti, F.; Giarrusso, M.; Giavitto, G.; Giglietto, N.; Giordano, F.; Giuliani, A.; Glicenstein, J.; Gnatyk, R.; Goldoni, P.; González, M. M.; Gourgouliatos, K.; Granot, J.; Grasso, D.; Green, J.; Grillo, A.; Gueta, O.; Gunji, S.; Halim, A.; Hassan, T.; Heller, M.; Hernández Cadena, S.; Hiroshima, N.; Hnatyk, B.; Hofmann, W.; Holder, J.; Horan, D.; Hörandel, J.; Horvath, P.; Hovatta, T.; Hrabovsky, M.; Hrupec, D.; Hughes, G.; Humensky, T. B.; Hütten, M.; Iarlori, M.; Inada, T.; Inoue, S.; Iocco, F.; Iori, M.; Jamrozy, M.; Janecek, P.; Jin, W.; Jouvin, L.; Jurysek, J.; Karukes, E.; Katarzyński, K.; Kazanas, D.; Kerszberg, D.; Kherlakian, M. C.; Kissmann, R.; Knödlseder, J.; Kobayashi, Y.; Kohri, K.; Komin, N.; Kubo, H.; Kushida, J.; Lamanna, G.; Lapington, J.; Laporte, P.; Leigui de Oliveira, M. A.; Lenain, J.; Leone, F.; Leto, G.; Lindfors, E.; Lohse, T.; Lombardi, S.; Longo, F.; Lopez, A.; López, M.; López-Coto, R.; Loporchio, S.; Luque-Escamilla, P. L.; Mach, E.; Maggio, C.; Maier, G.; Mallamaci, M.; Malta Nunes de Almeida, R.; Mandat, D.; Manganaro, M.; Mangano, S.; Manicò, G.; Marculewicz, M.; Mariotti, M.; Markoff, S.; Marquez, P.; Martí, J.; Martinez, O.; Martínez, M.; Martínez, G.; Martínez-Huerta, H.; Maurin, G.; Mazin, D.; Mbarubucyeye, J. D.; Medina Miranda, D.; Meyer, M.; Miceli, M.; Miener, T.; Minev, M.; Miranda, J. M.; Mirzoyan, R.; Mizuno, T.; Mode, B.; Moderski, R.; Mohrmann, L.; Molina, E.; Montaruli, T.; Moralejo, A.; Morcuende-Parrilla, D.; Morselli, A.; Mukherjee, R.; Mundell, C.; Nagai, A.; Nakamori, T.; Nemmen, R.; Niemiec, J.; Nieto, D.; Nikołajuk, M.; Ninci, D.; Noda, K.; Nosek, D.; Nozaki, S.; Ohira, Y.; Ohishi, M.; Ohtani, Y.; Oka, T.; Okumura, A.; Ong, R. A.; Orienti, M.; Orito, R.; Orlandini, M.; Orlando, S.; Orlando, E.; Ostrowski, M.; Oya, I.; Pagano, I.; Pagliaro, A.; Palatiello, M.; Pantaleo, F. R.; Paredes, J. M.; Pareschi, G.; Parmiggiani, N.; Patricelli, B.; Pavletić, L.; Pe'er, A.; Pecimotika, M.; Pérez-Romero, J.; Persic, M.; Petruk, O.; Pfrang, K.; Piano, G.; Piatteli, P.; Pietropaolo, E.; Pillera, R.; Pilszyk, B.; Pintore, F.; Pohl, M.; Poireau, V.; Prado, R. R.; Prandini, E.; Prast, J.; Principe, G.; Prokoph, H.; Prouza, M.; Przybilski, H.; Pühlhofer, G.; Pumo, M. L.; Queiroz, F.; Quirrenbach, A.; Rainò, S.; Rando, R.; Razzaque, S.; Recchia, S.; Reimer, O.; Reisenegger, A.; Renier, Y.; Rhode, W.; Ribeiro, D.; Ribó, M.; Richtler, T.; Rico, J.; Rieger, F.; Rinchiuso, L.; Rizi, V.; Rodriguez, J.; Rodriguez Fernandez, G.; Rodriguez Ramirez, J. C.; Rojas, G.; Romano, P.; Romeo, G.; Rosado, J.; Rowell, G.; Rudak, B.; Russo, F.; Sadeh, I.; Sæther Hatlen, E.; Safi-Harb, S.; Salesa Greus, F.; Salina, G.; Sanchez, D.; Sánchez-Conde, M.; Sangiorgi, P.; Sano, H.; Santander, M.; Santos, E. M.; Santos-Lima, R.; Sanuy, A.; Sarkar, S.; Saturni, F. G.; Sawangwit, U.; Schussler, F.; Schwanke, U.; Sciacca, E.; Scuderi, S.; Seglar-Arroyo, M.; Sergijenko, O.; Servillat, M.; Seweryn, K.; Shalchi, A.; Sharma, P.; Shellard, R. C.; Siejkowski, H.; Silk, J.; Siqueira, C.; Sliusar, V.; Słowikowska, A.; Sokolenko, A.; Sol, H.; Spencer, S.; Stamerra, A.; Stanič, S.; Starling, R.; Stolarczyk, T.; Straumann, U.; Strišković, J.; Suda, Y.; Suomijarvi, T.; Świerk, P.; Tavecchio, F.; Taylor, L.; Tejedor, L. A.; Teshima, M.; Testa, V.; Tibaldo, L.; Todero Peixoto, C. J.; Tokanai, F.; Tonev, D.; Tosti, G.; Tosti, L.; Tothill, N.; Truzzi, S.; Travnicek, P.; Vagelli, V.; Vallage, B.; Vallania, P.; van Eldik, C.; Vandenbroucke, J.; Varner, G. S.; Vassiliev, V.; Vázquez Acosta, M.; Vecchi, M.; Ventura, S.; Vercellone, S.; Vergani, S.; Verna, G.; Viana, A.; Vigorito, C. F.; Vink, J.; Vitale, V.; Vorobiov, S.; Vovk, I.; Vuillaume, T.; Wagner, S. J.; Walter, R.; Watson, J.; Weniger, C.; White, R.; White, M.; Wiemann, R.; Wierzcholska, A.; Will, M.; Williams, D. A.; Wischnewski, R.; Yanagita, S.; Yang, L.; Yoshikoshi, T.; Zacharias, M.; Zaharijas, G.; Zakaria, A. A.; Zampieri, L.; Zanin, R.; Zaric, D.; Zavrtanik, M.; Zavrtanik, D.; Zdziarski, A. A.; Zech, A.; Zechlin, H.; Zhdanov, V. I.; Živec, M.--Published by IOP Publishing Ltd on behalf of Sissa Medialab. Original content from this work may be used under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 licence. Any further distribution of this work must maintain attribution to the author(s) and the title of the work, journal citation and DOI. ; We provide an updated assessment of the power of the Cherenkov Telescope Array (CTA) to search for thermally produced dark matter at the TeV scale, via the associated gamma-ray signal from pair-annihilating dark matter particles in the region around the Galactic centre. We find that CTA will open a new window of discovery potential, significantly extending the range of robustly testable models given a standard cuspy profile of the dark matter density distribution. Importantly, even for a cored profile, the projected sensitivity of CTA will be sufficient to probe various well-motivated models of thermally produced dark matter at the TeV scale. This is due to CTA's unprecedented sensitivity, angular and energy resolutions, and the planned observational strategy. The survey of the inner Galaxy will cover a much larger region than corresponding previous observational campaigns with imaging atmospheric Cherenkov telescopes. CTA will map with unprecedented precision the large-scale diffuse emission in high-energy gamma rays, constituting a background for dark matter searches for which we adopt state-of-the-art models based on current data. Throughout our analysis, we use up-to-date event reconstruction Monte Carlo tools developed by the CTA consortium, and pay special attention to quantifying the level of instrumental systematic uncertainties, as well as background template systematic errors, required to probe thermally produced dark matter at these energies. © 2021 The Author(s). ; We gratefully acknowledge financial support from the following agencies and organisations: State Committee of Science of Armenia, Armenia; The Australian Research Council, Astronomy Australia Ltd, The University of Adelaide, Australian National University, Monash University, The University of New South Wales, The University of Sydney, Western Sydney University, Australia; Federal Ministry of Education, Science and Research, and Innsbruck University, Austria; Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Cientifico e Tecnologico (CNPq), Fundacao de Amparo a Pesquisa do Estado do Rio de Janeiro (FAPERJ), Fundacao de Amparo a Pesquisa do Estado de Sao Paulo (FAPESP), Ministry of Science, Technology, Innovations and Communications (MCTIC), and Instituto Serrapilheira, Brasil; Ministry of Education and Science, National RI Roadmap Project DO1-153/28.08.2018, Bulgaria; The Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada and the Canadian Space Agency, Canada; CONICYT-Chile grants CATA AFB 170002, ANID PIA/APOYO AFB 180002, ACT 1406, FONDECYT-Chile grants, 1161463, 1170171, 1190886, 1171421, 1170345, 1201582, Gemini-ANID 32180007, Chile; Croatian Science Foundation, Rudjer Boskovic Institute, University of Osijek, University of Rijeka, University of Split, Faculty of Electrical Engineering, Mechanical Engineering and Naval Architecture, University of Zagreb, Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Computing, Croatia; Ministry of Education, Youth and Sports, MEYS LM2015046, LM2018105, LTT17006, EU/MEYS CZ.02.1.01/0.0/0.0/16_013/0001403, CZ.02.1.01/0.0/0.0/18_046/0016007 and CZ.02.1.01/0.0/0.0/16_019/0000754, Czech Republic; Academy of Finland (grant nr.317636, 320045, 317383 and 320085), Finland; Ministry of Higher Education and Research, CNRS-INSU and CNRS-IN2P3, CEA-Irfu, ANR, Regional Council Ile de France, Labex ENIGMASS, OSUG2020, P2IO and OCEVU, France; Max Planck Society, BMBF, DESY, Helmholtz Association, Germany; Department of Atomic Energy, Department of Science and Technology, India; Istituto Nazionale di Astrofisica (INAF), Istituto Nazionale di Fisica Nucleare (INFN), MIUR, Istituto Nazionale di Astrofisica (INAF-OABRERA) Grant Fondazione Cariplo/Regione Lombardia ID 2014-1980/RST_ERC, Italy; ICRR, University of Tokyo, JSPS, MEXT, Japan; Netherlands Research School for Astronomy (NOVA), Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (NWO), Netherlands; University of Oslo, Norway; Ministry of Science and Higher Education, DIR/WK/2017/12, the National Centre for Research and Development and the National Science Centre, UMO-2016/22/M/ST9/00583, Poland; Slovenian Research Agency, grants P1-0031, P1-0385, I0-0033, J1-9146, J1-1700, N1-0111, and the Young Researcher program, Slovenia; South African Department of Science and Technology and National Research Foundation through the South African Gamma-Ray Astronomy Programme, South Africa; The Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation and the Spanish Research State Agency (AEI) through grants AYA2016-79724-C4-1-P, AYA2016-80889-P, AYA2016-76012-C3-1-P, BES-2016-076342, ESP2017-87055-C2-1-P, FPA2017-82729-C6-1-R, FPA2017-82729-C6-2-R, FPA2017-82729-C6-3-R, FPA2017-82729-C6-4-R, FPA2017-82729-C6-5-R, FPA2017-82729-C6-6-R, PGC2018-095161-B-I00, PGC2018-095512-B-I00; the \Centro de Excelencia Severo Ochoa"program through grants no. SEV-2015-0548, SEV-2016-0597, SEV-2016-0588, SEV-2017-0709; the "Unidad de Excelencia Maria de Maeztu" program through grant no. MDM-2015-0509; the "Ramon y Cajal" programme through grants RYC-2013-14511, RyC-2013-14660, RYC-2017-22665; and the MultiDark Consolider Network FPA2017-90566-REDC. Atraccion de Talento contract no. 2016-T1/TIC-1542 granted by the Comunidad de Madrid; the "Postdoctoral Junior Leader Fellowship" programme from La Caixa Banking Foundation, grants no. LCF/BQ/LI18/11630014 and LCF/BQ/PI18/11630012; the "Programa Operativo" FEDER2014-2020, Consejeria de Economia y Conocimiento de la Junta de Andalucia (ref. 1257737), PAIDI 2020 (ref. P18-FR-1580), and Universidad de Jaen; the Spanish AEI EQC2018-005094-P FEDER 2014-2020; the European Union's "Horizon 2020" research and innovation programme under Marie Sklodowska-Curie grant agreement no. 665919; and the ESCAPE project with grant no. GA:824064, Spain; Swedish Research Council, Royal Physiographic Society of Lund, Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, The Swedish National Infrastructure for Computing (SNIC) at Lunarc (Lund), Sweden; State Secretariat for Education, Research and Innovation (SERI) and Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF), Switzerland; Durham University, Leverhulme Trust, Liverpool University, University of Leicester, University of Oxford, Royal Society, Science and Technology Facilities Council, U.K.; U.S. National Science Foundation, U.S. Department of Energy, Argonne National Laboratory, Barnard College, University of California, University of Chicago, Columbia University, Georgia Institute of Technology, Institute for Nuclear and Particle Astrophysics (INPAC-MRPI program), Iowa State University, the Smithsonian Institution, Washington University McDonnell Center for the Space Sciences, The University of Wisconsin and the Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation, U.S.A. The research leading to these results has received funding from the European Union's Seventh Framework Programme (FP7/2007-2013) under grant agreements No 262053 and No 317446. This project is receiving funding from the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programs under agreement No 676134. ; Peer reviewed

A comprehensive understanding of temporal variability of subsurface soil moisture (SM) is paramount in hydrological and agricultural applications such as rainfed farming and irrigation. Since the SMOS (Soil Moisture and Ocean Salinity) mission was launched in 2009, globally available satellite SM retrievals have been used to investigate SM dynamics, based on the fact that useful information about subsurface SM is contained in their time series. SM along the depth profile is influenced by atmospheric forcing and local SM properties. Until now, subsurface SM was estimated by weighting preceding information of remotely sensed surface SM time series according to an optimized depth-specific characteristic time length. However, especially in regions with extreme SM conditions, the response time is supposed to be seasonally variable and depends on related processes occurring at different timescales. Aim of this study was to quantify the response time by means of the time lag between the trend series of satellite and in-situ SM observations using a Dynamic Time Warping (DTW) technique. DTW was applied to the SMOS satellite SM L4 product at 1 km resolution developed by the Barcelona Expert Center (BEC), and in-situ near-surface and root-zone SM of four representative stations at multiple depths, located in the Soil Moisture Measurements Station Network of the University of Salamanca (REMEDHUS) in Western Spain. DTW was customized to control the rate of accumulation and reduction of time lag during wetting and drying conditions and to consider the onset dates of pronounced precipitation events to increase sensitivity to prominent features of the input series. The temporal variability of climate factors in combination with crop growing seasons were used to indicate prevailing SM-related processes. Hereby, a comparison of long-term precipitation recordings and estimations of potential evapotranspiration (PET) allowed us to estimate SM seasons. The spatial heterogeneity of land use was analyzed by means of high-resolution images of Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) from Sentinel-2 to provide information about the level of spatial representativeness of SMOS observations to each in-situ station. Results of the spatio-temporal analysis of the study were then evaluated to understand seasonally and spatially changing patterns in time lag. The time lag evolution describes a variable characteristic time length by considering the relevant processes which link SMOS and in-situ SM observation, which is an important step to accurately infer subsurface SM from satellite time series. At a further stage, the approach needs to be applied to different SM networks to understand the seasonal, climate- and site-specific characteristic behaviour of time lag and to decide, whether general conclusions can be drawn. ; The project that gave rise to these results received the support of a fellowship from "la Caixa" Foundation (ID 100010434). The fellowship code is LCF/BQ/DI18/11660050. This project has received funding from the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under the Marie Sklodowska-Curie grant agreement No. 713673. This study was also funded through the award "Unidad de Excelencia María de Maeztu" MDM-2016-0600 and by the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation through the projects ESP2017-89463-C3-1-R, ESP2017-89463-C3-2-R and ESP2017-89463-C3-3-R. ; Peer reviewed

Aerodynamic canopy height (h(a)) is the effective height of vegetation canopy for its influence on atmospheric fluxes and is a key parameter of surface-atmosphere coupling. However, methods to estimate h(a) from data are limited. This synthesis evaluates the applicability and robustness of the calculation of h(a) from eddy covariance momentum-flux data. At 69 forest sites, annual h(a) robustly predicted site-to-site and year-to-year differences in canopy heights (R-2=0.88, 111site-years). At 23 cropland/grassland sites, weekly h(a) successfully captured the dynamics of vegetation canopies over growing seasons (R-2>0.70 in 74site-years). Our results demonstrate the potential of flux-derived h(a) determination for tracking the seasonal, interannual, and/or decadal dynamics of vegetation canopies including growth, harvest, land use change, and disturbance. The large-scale and time-varying h(a) derived from flux networks worldwide provides a new benchmark for regional and global Earth system models and satellite remote sensing of canopy structure. Plain Language Summary Vegetation canopy height is a key descriptor of the Earth surface and is in use by many modeling and conservation applications. However, large-scale and time-varying data of canopy heights are often unavailable. This synthesis evaluates the applicability and robustness of the calculation of canopy heights from the momentum flux data measured at eddy covariance flux tower sites (i.e., meteorological observation towers with high frequency measurements of wind speed and surface fluxes). We show that the aerodynamic estimation of annual canopy heights robustly predicts the site-to-site and year-to-year differences in canopy heights across a wide variety of forests. The weekly aerodynamic canopy heights successfully capture the dynamics of vegetation canopies over growing seasons at cropland and grassland sites. Our results demonstrate the potential of aerodynamic canopy heights for tracking the seasonal, interannual, and/or decadal dynamics of vegetation canopies including growth, harvest, land use change, and disturbance. Given the amount of data collected and the diversity of vegetation covered by the global networks of eddy covariance flux tower sites, the flux-derived canopy height has great potential for providing a new benchmark for regional and global Earth system models and satellite remote sensing of canopy structure. ; U.S. Department of Energy's Office of ScienceUnited States Department of Energy (DOE) [DE-SC0012456, DE-AC02-05CH11231] ; This study is supported by FLUXNET and AmeriFlux projects, sponsored by U.S. Department of Energy's Office of Science (DE-SC0012456 and DE-AC02-05CH11231). We thank the supports from AmeriFlux Data Team: Gilberto Pastorello, Deb Agarwal, Danielle Christianson, You-Wei Cheah, Norman Beekwilder, Tom Boden, Bai Yang, and Dario Papale, and Berkeley Biomet Lab: Siyan Ma, Joseph Verfaillie, Elke Eichelmann, and Sara Knox. This work uses eddy covariance and BADM data acquired and shared by the investigators involved in the AmeriFlux and Fluxnet-Canada Research Network. The site list and corresponding references are provided in the supporting information. We thank Claudia Wagner-Riddle, Andy Suyker, David Cook, Asko Noormets, Paul Stoy, and Brian Amiro for providing additional data. All actual canopy height data can be downloaded from AmeriFlux BADM. The R codes and aerodynamic canopy height data can be accessed at http://github.com/chuhousen/aerodynamic_canopy_height. ; Public domain authored by a U.S. government employee