Untitled DocumentDeveloping land parameter sets for distributed modeling
Macro Theme Area:
Integrated Modeling [Project ID: M25]
PI:
Binayak Mohanty
CO-PI(s):
N/A
Basin focus:
Regional SW, Rio Grande
Specific area in
basin /
field sites:
N/A
Summary/Goals: Los Alamos National Laboratory in conjunction with the NSF Science and Technology Center for Sustainability of semi-Arid Hydrology and Riparian Areas (SAHRA) is developing a simulation model of the Rio Grande Basin for use in scientific analyses of the water balance. The model includes surface and subsurface flow components. Critical input parameters are the soil hydrologic properties for this model so techniques to estimate these properties for various spatial resolutions must be developed. Soil properties are scale dependent so their values change with the size of the area being used for the simulation. Therefore, it is important that scale dependent behavior be included in the estimation process.
Activities and outcomes during past year:
We have developd soil hydrologic properties database for the Rio Grande Basin from its headwaters in the San Juan Mountains of southern Colorado to the Fort Quitman, Texas gauging station.
Our research on estimating soil hydraulic parameters using air- and space-borne passive microwave sensors brings unprecedented understanding and algorithms for many earth sciences applications. Our group has developed several new mathematical algorithms utilizing remotely sensed soil moisture, genetic algorithm, neural network, and up/downscaling schemes for estimating complex soil hydraulic parameters at different spatial resolutions. This finding will provide necessary distributed parameters for general circulation, climate, weather, hydrology, ecology, water and crop management, contaminant transport, and other.
Plans for the upcoming year:
Our project ended in Sept 30, 2008
