scholarly journals Global Assimilation of Remotely Sensed Leaf Area Index: The Impact of Updating More State Variables Within a Land Surface Model

2022 ◽  
Vol 3 ◽  
Author(s):  
Azbina Rahman ◽  
Xinxuan Zhang ◽  
Paul Houser ◽  
Timothy Sauer ◽  
Viviana Maggioni
Keyword(s):  
Leaf Area Index ◽  
Leaf Area ◽  
Land Surface ◽  
Land Surface Model ◽  
Net Ecosystem Exchange ◽  
Surface Model ◽  
Random Errors ◽  
Area Index ◽  
Leaf Mass ◽  
The Impact

As vegetation regulates water, carbon, and energy cycles from the local to the global scale, its accurate representation in land surface models is crucial. The assimilation of satellite-based vegetation observations in a land surface model has the potential to improve the estimation of global carbon and energy cycles, which in turn can enhance our ability to monitor and forecast extreme hydroclimatic events, ecosystem dynamics, and crop production. This work proposes the assimilation of a remotely sensed vegetation product (Leaf Area Index, LAI) within the Noah Multi-Parameterization land surface model using an Ensemble Kalman Filter technique. The impact of updating leaf mass along with LAI is also investigated. Results show that assimilating LAI data improves the estimation of transpiration and net ecosystem exchange, which is further enhanced by also updating the leaf mass. Specifically, transpiration anomaly correlation coefficients improve in about 77 and 66% of the global land area thanks to the assimilation of leaf area index with and without updating leaf mass, respectively. Random errors in transpiration are also reduced, with an improvement of the unbiased root mean square error in 70% (74%) of the total area without the update of leaf mass (with the update of leaf mass). Similarly, net ecosystem exchange anomaly correlation coefficients improve from 52 to 75% and random errors improve from 49 to 62% of the total pixels after the update of leaf mass. Better performances for both transpiration and net ecosystem exchange are observed across croplands, but the largest improvement is shown over forests and woodland. The global scope of this work makes it particularly important in data poor regions (e.g., Africa, South Asia), where ground observations are sparse or not available altogether but where an accurate estimation of carbon and energy variables can be critical to improve ecosystem and crop management.

scholarly journals Ability of the land surface model ISBA-A-gs to simulate leaf area index at the global scale: Comparison with satellites products

2006 ◽  
Vol 111 (D18) ◽  
Author(s):  
Anne-Laure Gibelin ◽  
Jean-Christophe Calvet ◽  
Jean-Louis Roujean ◽  
Lionel Jarlan ◽  
Sietse O. Los
Keyword(s):  
Leaf Area Index ◽  
Leaf Area ◽  
Land Surface ◽  
Land Surface Model ◽  
Global Scale ◽  
Surface Model ◽  
Area Index

scholarly journals The Influence of Assimilating Leaf Area Index in a Land Surface Model on Global Water Fluxes and Storages

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Xinxuan Zhang ◽  
Viviana Maggioni ◽  
Azbina Rahman ◽  
Paul Houser ◽  
Yuan Xue ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Soil Moisture ◽  
Data Assimilation ◽  
Leaf Area Index ◽  
Leaf Area ◽  
Land Surface ◽  
Water Storage ◽  
Land Surface Model ◽  
Surface Model ◽  
Area Index ◽  
Global Water

Abstract. Vegetation plays a fundamental role not only in the energy and carbon cycle, but also the global water balance by controlling surface evapotranspiration. Thus, accurately estimating vegetation-related variables has the potential to improve our understanding and estimation of the dynamic interactions between the water and carbon cycles. This study aims to assess to what extent a land surface model can be optimized through the assimilation of leaf area index (LAI) observations at the global scale. Two observing system simulation experiments (OSSEs) are performed to evaluate the efficiency of assimilating LAI through an Ensemble Kalman Filter (EnKF) to estimate LAI, evapotranspiration (ET), interception evaporation (CIE), canopy water storage (CWS), surface soil moisture (SSM), and terrestrial water storage (TWS). Results show that the LAI data assimilation framework effectively reduces errors in LAI simulations. LAI assimilation also improves the model estimates of all the water flux and storage variables considered in this study (ET, CIE, CWS, SSM, and TWS), even when the forcing precipitation is strongly positively biased (extremely wet condition). However, it tends to worsen some of the model estimated water-related variables (SSM and TWS) when the forcing precipitation is affected by a dry bias. This is attributed to the fact that the amount of water in the land surface model is conservative and the LAI assimilation introduces more vegetation, which requires more water than what available within the soil. Future work should investigate a multi-variate data assimilation system that concurrently merges both LAI and soil moisture (or TWS) observations.

scholarly journals A leaf area index data set acquired in Sahelian rangelands of Gourma in Mali over the 2005–2017 period

2019 ◽  
Vol 11 (2) ◽  
pp. 675-686
Author(s):  
Eric Mougin ◽  
Mamadou Oumar Diawara ◽  
Nogmana Soumaguel ◽  
Ali Amadou Maïga ◽  
Valérie Demarez ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Leaf Area Index ◽  
Leaf Area ◽  
Land Surface ◽  
Model Development ◽  
Land Surface Model ◽  
Product Evaluation ◽  
Tree Canopy ◽  
Surface Model ◽  
Data Set ◽  
Area Index

Abstract. The leaf area index of Sahelian rangelands and related variables such as the vegetation cover fraction, the fraction of absorbed photosynthetically active radiation and the clumping index were measured between 2005 and 2017 in the Gourma region of northern Mali. These variables, known as climate essential variables, were derived from the acquisition and the processing of hemispherical photographs taken along 1 km linear sampling transects for five contrasted canopies and one millet field. The same sampling protocol was applied in a seasonally inundated Acacia open forest, along a 0.5 km transect, by taking photographs of the understorey and the tree canopy. These observations collected over more than a decade, in a remote and not very accessible region, provide a relevant and unique data set that can be used for a better understanding of the Sahelian vegetation response to the current rainfall changes. The collected data can also be used for satellite product evaluation and land surface model development and validation. This paper aims to present the field work that was carried out during 13 successive rainy seasons, the measured vegetation variables, and the associated open database. Finally, a few examples of data use are shown. DOI of the referenced data set: https://doi.org/10.17178/AMMA-CATCH.CE.Veg_Gh.

scholarly journals Assimilation of Remotely Sensed Leaf Area Index into the Noah-MP Land Surface Model: Impacts on Water and Carbon Fluxes and States over the Continental United States

2019 ◽  
Vol 20 (7) ◽  
pp. 1359-1377 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sujay V. Kumar ◽  
David M. Mocko ◽  
Shugong Wang ◽  
Christa D. Peters-Lidard ◽  
Jordan Borak
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Leaf Area Index ◽  
Leaf Area ◽  
Land Surface ◽  
Land Surface Model ◽  
Carbon Fluxes ◽  
Surface Model ◽  
Vegetation Changes ◽  
Area Index ◽  
Terrestrial Water

Abstract Accurate representation of vegetation states is required for the modeling of terrestrial water–energy–carbon exchanges and the characterization of the impacts of natural and anthropogenic vegetation changes on the land surface. This study presents a comprehensive evaluation of the impact of assimilating remote sensing–based leaf area index (LAI) retrievals over the continental United States in the Noah-MP land surface model, during a time period of 2000–17. The results demonstrate that the assimilation has a beneficial impact on the simulation of key water budget terms, such as soil moisture, evapotranspiration, snow depth, terrestrial water storage, and streamflow, when compared with a large suite of reference datasets. In addition, the assimilation of LAI is also found to improve the carbon fluxes of gross primary production (GPP) and net ecosystem exchange (NEE). Most prominent improvements in the water and carbon variables are observed over the agricultural areas of the United States, where assimilation improves the representation of vegetation seasonality impacted by cropping schedules. The systematic, added improvements from assimilation in a configuration that employs high-quality boundary conditions highlight the significant utility of LAI data assimilation in capturing the impacts of vegetation changes.

scholarly journals Sensitivity of Surface Fluxes in the ECMWF Land Surface Model to the Remotely Sensed Leaf Area Index and Root Distribution: Evaluation with Tower Flux Data

Atmosphere ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 11 (12) ◽  
pp. 1362
Author(s):  
David Stevens ◽  
Pedro M. A. Miranda ◽  
René Orth ◽  
Souhail Boussetta ◽  
Gianpaolo Balsamo ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Leaf Area Index ◽  
Leaf Area ◽  
Land Surface ◽  
Root Distribution ◽  
Land Surface Model ◽  
Moisture Stress ◽  
Stomatal Resistance ◽  
Surface Fluxes ◽  
Surface Model ◽  
Area Index

The surface-atmosphere turbulent exchanges couple the water, energy and carbon budgets in the Earth system. The biosphere plays an important role in the evaporation process, and vegetation related parameters such as the leaf area index (LAI), vertical root distribution and stomatal resistance are poorly constrained due to sparse observations at the spatio-temporal scales at which land surface models (LSMs) operate. In this study, we use the Carbon Hydrology Tiled European Center for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF) Scheme for Surface Exchanges over Land (CHTESSEL) model and investigate the sensitivity of the simulated turbulent fluxes to these vegetation related parameters. Observed data from 17 FLUXNET towers were used to force and evaluate model simulations with different vegetation parameter configurations. The replacement of the current LAI climatology used by CHTESSEL, by a new high-resolution climatology, representative of the station’s location, has a small impact on the simulated fluxes. Instead, a revision of the root profile considering a uniform root distribution reduces the underestimation of evaporation during water stress conditions. Despite the limitations of using only one model and a limited number of stations, our results highlight the relevance of root distribution in controlling soil moisture stress, which is likely to be applicable to other LSMs.

scholarly journals Assimilation of Soil Wetness Index and Leaf Area Index into the ISBA-A-gs land surface model: grassland case study

2011 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
pp. 1831-1877 ◽  
Author(s):  
A. L. Barbu ◽  
J.-C. Calvet ◽  
J.-F. Mahfouf ◽  
C. Albergel ◽  
S. Lafont
Keyword(s):  
Data Assimilation ◽  
Leaf Area Index ◽  
Leaf Area ◽  
Land Surface ◽  
Root Zone ◽  
Land Surface Model ◽  
Surface Model ◽  
Area Index ◽  
Wetness Index ◽  
Soil Wetness

Abstract. The performance of the joint assimilation in a land surface model of a Soil Wetness Index (SWI) product provided by an exponential filter together with Leaf Area Index (LAI) is investigated. The data assimilation is evaluated with different setups using the SURFEX modeling platform, for a period of seven years (2001–2007), at the SMOSREX grassland site in southwestern France. The results obtained with a Simplified Extended Kalman Filter demonstrate the effectiveness of a joint data assimilation scheme when both SWI and Leaf Area Index are merged into the ISBA-A-gs land surface model. The assimilation of a retrieved Soil Wetness Index product presents several challenges that are investigated in this study. A significant improvement of around 13% of the root-zone soil water content is obtained by assimilating dimensionless root-zone SWI data. For comparison, the assimilation of in situ surface soil moisture is considered as well. A lower impact on the root zone is noticed. Under specific conditions, the transfer of the information from the surface to the root zone was found not accurate. Also, our results indicate that the assimilation of in situ LAI data may correct a number of deficiencies in the model, such as low LAI values in the senescence phase by using a seasonal-dependent error definition for background and observations. In order to verify the specification of the errors for SWI and LAI products, a posteriori diagnostics are employed. This approach highlights the importance of the assimilation design on the quality of the analysis. The impact of data assimilation scheme on CO2 fluxes is also quantified by using measurements of net CO2 fluxes gathered at the SMOSREX site from 2005 to 2007. An improvement of about 5% in terms of rms error is obtained.

scholarly journals A leaf area index, LAI, data set acquired in Sahelian rangelands (Gourma, Mali) over the 2005–2017 period

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Eric Mougin ◽  
Mamadou Oumar Diawara ◽  
Nogmana Soumaguel ◽  
Ali Amadou Maiga ◽  
Valerie Demarez ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Leaf Area Index ◽  
Leaf Area ◽  
Land Surface ◽  
Model Development ◽  
Land Surface Model ◽  
Product Evaluation ◽  
Tree Canopy ◽  
Surface Model ◽  
Data Set ◽  
Area Index

Abstract. The leaf area index, LAI, of Sahelian rangelands and related variables such as the vegetation cover fraction, fCover, the fraction of absorbed photosynthetically active radiation, fAPAR, and the clumping index, λo, were measured in the Gourma region (Mali) during 13 successive rainy seasons, between 2005 and 2017. These variables, known as climate essential variables, were derived from the acquisition and the processing of hemispherical photographs taken along 1 km linear sampling transects, for 5 contrasted canopies and one millet field. The same sampling protocol was applied in a seasonally inundated Acacia open forest, along a 0.5 km transect, by taking photographs of the understorey and the tree canopy. These observations collected over more than a decade, in a remote and not very accessible region, provide a relevant and unique data set that can be used for a better understanding of the Sahelian vegetation response to the current rainfall changes. The collected data can also be used for satellite product evaluation and land surface model development and validation.

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