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Relationship between geological structures and groundwater flow and groundwater salinity in Al Jaaw Plain, United Arab Emirates; mapping and analysis by means of remote sensing and GIS

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Abstract

Geological structures can be of great influence groundwater movement and accumulation in the surface and subsurface, and should therefore be taken into consideration in studies related to groundwater contamination impact. This study attempts to investigate the influence of geological structures on groundwater flow and groundwater salinity in Al Jaaw Plain, United Arab Emirates. A set of thematic maps derived from digital elevation model (DEM), LANDSAT, and Spaceborn Imagine Radar-C/X-Band Synthetic Aperture Radar were enhanced by applying Soble filter with 10 % threshold and equalization enhancement to reveal and map geological structures crosscut the entire region. Drainage pattern was derived from DEM automatically using D8 algorithm. The algorithm determines in which neighboring pixel any water in a central pixel will flow naturally. The trends of geological structures and drainage pattern extracted from remote sensing data were correlated with the spatial variation of hydraulic head, thickness aquifer, and groundwater salinity in the region. The results of the study reveal that the wadi courses, thickness of the aquifer, and topography are structural controlled by NNW–SSE, NE–SW, and ENE–WSW trending fault zones, significantly influencing the groundwater flow and groundwater contamination in Al Jaaw Plain.

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Acknowledgments

The authors would like to thank Professor Peter Guth from USA Academic Navy, the Earth Remote Sensing Data Analysis Centre (ERSDAC), Japan; the NASA Land Processes Distributed Active Archive Center and the User Services USGS Earth Resources Observation and Science (EROS), and the Consortium for Spatial Information (CSI) of the Consultative Group for International Agricultural Research (CGIAR) for providing and distributing scientific advises and remotely sensed data.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Civil and Environmental Engineering Department, United Arab Emirates University, P.O. Box 15551, Al-Ain, United Arab Emirates

    Samy Ismail Elmahdy & Mohamed Mostafa Mohamed

  2. Irrigation and Hydraulics Department, Faculty of Engineering, Cairo University, P.O. Box 12211, Giza, Egypt

    Mohamed Mostafa Mohamed

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  1. Samy Ismail Elmahdy
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  2. Mohamed Mostafa Mohamed
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Correspondence to Samy Ismail Elmahdy.

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Elmahdy, S.I., Mohamed, M.M. Relationship between geological structures and groundwater flow and groundwater salinity in Al Jaaw Plain, United Arab Emirates; mapping and analysis by means of remote sensing and GIS. Arab J Geosci 7, 1249–1259 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12517-013-0895-4

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12517-013-0895-4

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