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Spatial and temporal variability of soil moisture in relation with topographic and meteorological factors in south of Ardabil Province, Iran

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Abstract

This research has been tried to evaluate the spatial and temporal variability of surface soil moisture (SM) in a semi-arid and cold region of Ardabil Province in Iran with an area of about 10,000 km2. The used SM data is the SMAP Enhanced L2 Radiometer Half-Orbit 9 km Soil Moisture, provided by NASA. The study area was subdivided into 120 locations consisting 10 × 12 grids, matching with the pixels of the SMAP images. In order to evaluate the spatial variations of SM, the relation of mean SM with coefficient of variation and standard deviation has been evaluated and, then, the representative location for mean SM of the area has been identified using the index of temporal stability. Moreover, the effect of topographic factors (elevation, slope, and aspect) on spatial variations of SM, and the effect of meteorological factors (rainfall, sunshine hours, temperature, relative humidity, wind speed, and number of dry days) on temporal variations of SM have been investigated. The relation of mean SM with the coefficient of variation and standard deviation represented an exponentially negative and upper convex shape, respectively. The SM content of the representative location had a correlation with the mean SM of the area with the coefficient of determination value of 0.91. Of the three topographic factors, only the slope factor, and of the meteorological factors all of them except the wind speed have showed a significant relationship with SM spatial and temporal variations respectively.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Watershed Management, Faculty of Natural Resources, Tarbiat Modares University, Noor, Mazandaran, Iran

    Husain Akbari Majdar & Mehdi Vafakhah

  2. Department of Remote Sensing, Faculty of Humanities, Tarbiat Modares University, Tehran, Iran

    Mohammad Sharifikia

  3. Department of Range and Watershed Management, University of Mohaghegh Ardabili, Ardabil, Iran

    Ardavan Ghorbani

Authors
  1. Husain Akbari Majdar
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  2. Mehdi Vafakhah
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  3. Mohammad Sharifikia
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  4. Ardavan Ghorbani
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Correspondence to Mehdi Vafakhah.

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Majdar, H.A., Vafakhah, M., Sharifikia, M. et al. Spatial and temporal variability of soil moisture in relation with topographic and meteorological factors in south of Ardabil Province, Iran. Environ Monit Assess 190, 500 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10661-018-6887-9

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10661-018-6887-9

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