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Monitoring soil salinity with remote sensing is difficult, but knowing the link between saline soil surface spectra, soil water, and salt transport processes might help in modeling for soil salinity monitoring. In this study, we used an indoor soil column experiment, an unmanned aerial vehicle multispectral sensor camera, and a soil moisture sensor to study the water and salt transport process in the soil column under different water addition conditions and investigate the relationship between the soil water and salt transport process and the spectral reflectance of the image on the soil surface. The observation results of the soil column show that the soil water and salt transportation process conforms to the basic transportation law of “salt moves together with water, and when water evaporates, salt is retained in the soil weight”. The salt accumulation phenomenon increases the image spectral reflectance of the surface layer of the soil column, while soil temperature has no effect on the reflectance. As the water percolates down, water and salt accumulate at the bottom of the soil column. The salinity index decreases instantly after the addition of brine and then tends to increase slowly. The experimental results indicate that this work can capture the relationship between the water and salt transport process and remote sensing spectra, which can provide theoretical basis and reference for soil water salinity monitoring.

The shrinkage issue has posed a significant challenge for the practical application of biodegradable foam materials. The varying temperature-pressure mode (VT-PM) was adopted to fabricate poly (butylene adipate-butylene terephthalate) (PBAT)/Polybutylene succinate (PBS) foams. Foam shrinkage was significantly improved by the synergistic effect of temperature and pressure, and the shrinkage resistance mechanism was investigated by analyzing the cell structure. The crystallization behavior of PBS was investigated using differential scanning calorimetry (DSC) and polarized optical microscope (POM). Small size PBS crystals were obtained during the temperature change process, and the heterogeneous nucleation of PBS crystals increased the foaming expansion ratio. It was also found that the thick cell wall was able to act as a skeleton to support the structure of large cell size (＞100 μm) foams, ensuring larger compression stress and modulus.

Salinization remains a major issue in soil degradation, for which biochar is a potential solution. In this meta-analysis, using 660 paired observations from 99 peer-reviewed articles, we evaluated biochar's effect on salt-affected soils and identified the initial soil properties, biochar properties and experimental factors influencing its efficacy. The results showed that the addition of biochar had a significant ameliorating effect on salt-affected soils. The soil electrical conductivity of saturated paste extract (ECe) was significantly reduced by 13.2%, and such effect was significant in severe salinization soil (rather than slight and moderate salinization). Meanwhile, the soil cation exchange capacity was significantly increased by 17.0%. However, the addition of biochar had no significant impact on soil pH. Model selection analyses further indicated that the level of initial salinity and the type of biochar feedstock were the most important factors regulating the response of soil ECe to biochar addition. In summary, while our study highlights the potential of biochar in ameliorating salt-affected soils, particularly in severely salinized soils, it also underscores the need for more comprehensive research in this field. Additional research is necessary to comprehensively address the significant heterogeneity of biochars, including their thorough characterization. In addition, more studies are required to explore the impact of biochar on both salt-tolerant and non-salt-tolerant plants in salt-affected soils.

Abstract Large-scale soil salinity surveys are time-costly and labor-intensive, and it is also more difficult to investigate historical salinity, while in arid and semi-arid regions, the investigation of the spatial and temporal characteristics of salinity can provide a scientific basis for the scientific prevention of salinity, With this objective, this study uses multi-source data combined with ensemble learning and Google Earth Engine to build a monitoring model to observe the evolution of salinization in the Werigan–Kuqa River Oasis from 1996 to 2021 and to analyze the driving factors. In this experiment, three ensemble learning models, Random Forest (RF), Extreme Gradient Boosting (XGBoost), and Light Gradient Boosting Machine (LightGBM), were established using data collected in the field for different years and some environmental variables, After the accuracy validation of the model, XGBoost had the highest accuracy of salinity prediction in this study area, with RMSE of 17.62 dS m−1, R2 of 0.73 and RPIQ of 2.45 in the test set. In this experiment, after Spearman correlation analysis of soil Electrical Conductivity (EC) with environmental variables, we found that the near-infrared band in the original band, the DEM in the topographic factor, the vegetation index based on remote sensing, and the salinity index soil EC had a strong correlation. The spatial distribution of salinization is generally characterized by good in the west and north and severe in the east and south. Non-salinization, light salinization, and moderate salinization gradually expanded southward and eastward from the interior of the western oasis over 25 years. Severe and very severe salinization gradually shifted from the northern edge of the oasis to the eastern and southeastern desert areas during the 25 years. The saline soils with the highest salinity class were distributed in most of the desert areas in the eastern part of the Werigan–Kuqa Oasis study area as well as in smaller areas in the west in 1996, shrinking in size and characterized by a discontinuous distribution by 2021. In terms of area change, the non-salinized area increased from 198.25 in 1996 to 1682.47 km2 in 2021. The area of saline soil with the highest salinization level decreased from 5708.77 in 1996 to 2246.87 km2 in 2021. overall, the overall salinization of the Werigan–Kuqa Oasis improved.

Climate change has caused inland wetlands shrinkage and exacerbated problems, such as sustainable development and ecological security, for years. These issues are mainly pronounced in the inland arid area. The ecological environment’s deterioration is especially severe in the drylands of the interior. However, dryland wetland changes and their response to climate are poorly understood. This study uses the K-means algorithm in Google Earth Engine (GEE) to classify two typical dryland wetlands (Ebinur and Bosten Lakes) for rapidly and accurately detecting dryland wetland changes. Moreover, it explores the long-term spatial–temporal variation in wetland distribution. In addition, it investigates the response of various lakes to climate change in northern and southern Xinjiang using wavelet analysis. The study’s results showed that K-means clustering in the GEE platform has a high classification accuracy (Kappa > 0.8) in wetland classification, making it a feasible approach. The terminal lake wetland types, represented by the Ebinur Lake, changed significantly between 2001 and 2021. In contrast, the inflow-outflow lake wetland types, represented by the Bosten Lake, perform more consistently. Significant spatial–temporal variation is observed at Ebinur Lake, with the lake gradually shrinking and transforming into a marsh, where the largest marsh proportion degrades into non-wetland during the year. Bosten Lake experienced frequent conversions between marsh and non-wetland throughout the year. Furthermore, the responses of various dryland lakes to climate change are consistent, and a low precedes precipitation and follows evapotranspiration. However, their sensitivity to climate response varies, with the terminal lake being most affected by climate change. Mastering the dynamic changes and climate response of dryland wetlands achieves the sustainable development goals of drylands, including carbon neutrality and peak carbon dioxide emissions.

Water scarcity has emerged as a major impediment to the long-term development of inland arid region basins. Increased human activity has produced land degradation in arid areas and water stress in recent years. The objective of this research was to expose patterns in land cover changes in inland arid basin and the mechanisms driving them, as well as to optimize the socioeconomic and ecological water consumption structure of water resources. Therefore, this research used Google Earth Engine to map land cover year by year from 2000 to 2020, simulated future land cover changes and driving force analysis using a Patch-generating land use simulation model, and finally established the relationship between water consumption of different systems and different land cover types using linear equations, and scenario simulation method were used to estimates the ecological and agricultural water consumption in 2035. The results showed (1) Over the previous 20 years, there has been an increase in the amount of saline, agricultural land, and natural vegetation (grassland, scrub, and forest), as well as a considerable drop around permanent glaciers and snow. (2) Under the Markov-2035 scenario, saline land decreases to 32.92 km2, natural vegetation decreases to 381.89 km2, arable land shrinks to 135.69 km2, and the permanent glacier shrinks to 30.03 km2. Ecological water consumption would be 0.127 × 108 m3, while agricultural water consumption would be 0.394 × 108 m3. (3) Elevation influenced the variety of all land cover types. Saline land was more sensitive to temperature, railroad proximity, and pH; agricultural land was more sensitive to population density and gross regional product; and natural vegetation was more sensitive to soil organic matter, railroad proximity, and temperature.

Soil salinization has hampered the achievement of sustainable development goals (SDGs) in many countries worldwide. Several countries have recently launched hyperspectral remote sensing satellites, opening new avenues for accurate soil-salinity monitoring. Among them, Gaofen-5 (GF-5) from China has a high comprehensive performance, including a spectral resolution of 5 nm, 330 bands, and signal-to-noise ratio of 700. However, the potential of GF-5 for estimating soil salinity is not well understood. In this study, we proposed a strategy that includes bootstrap methods, fractional order derivative (FOD) techniques and decision-level fusion models to exploit the soil salinity diagnostic information and reduce estimation uncertainty in the Ebinur Lake oasis in northwestern China. The results showed that the GF-5 data were suitable for assessing soil salinity. The FOD technique enhanced the correlation between soil salinity and spectra, identified more diagnostic bands, improved the accuracy of soil salinity estimation, and reduced model uncertainty. The low-order FOD outperformed the high-order FOD. The spectra processed by the 0.9 order derivative were the most correlated with soil salinity (r = −0.76). The model driven by the 0.8 order derivative produced the optimal estimated model (R2 = 0.95, root mean square error (RMSE) = 3.20 dS m−1 and a ratio of performance to interquartile distance (RPIQ) = 5.96). The model driven by the 0.8 order derivative had less uncertainty than the models based on the original and integer-order derivative (first- and second- derivatives) spectra. This study provides a reference for estimating soil salinity from GF-5 data using the proposed framework with low uncertainty and high accuracy. GF-5 data have great potential for assessing environmental problems and facilitating further SDGs.

The central region of Inner Mongolia is the northern ecological safety barrier of Beijing and even the whole country. It is one of the main sources of dust in North China, and air pollution control is the top priority in this region. In this study, the central region of Inner Mongolia was selected as the study area, multiple auxiliary variables were used to estimate the spatial distribution of PM2.5 concentration from 2016 to 2018 by geographically weighted regression, and the socioeconomic determinants of PM2.5 concentration were analyzed by geographic detectors. The results show that: 1) the established model can better estimate the spatial distribution of PM2.5 concentration in the study area, and the monthly mean correlation coefficient R of the verification parameters is stable, ranging from 0.58 to 0.66. 2) PM2.5 concentration in central Inner Mongolia showed significant temporal and spatial variation. The mean annual PM2.5 concentration along the Yellow River basin is the highest in the study area. PM2.5 concentration first increased and then decreased from 2016 to 2018. 3) Urban built-up area, permanent population and per capita GDP are the key factors affecting the spatial and temporal distribution of PM2.5 concentration in the study area. The results of this study provide theoretical basis and technical support for air pollution monitoring, management and prevention in central Inner Mongolia.

Ecological challenges resulting from soil salinization in the Tarim River Basin (TRB), exacerbated by climate change and human activities, have emphasized the need for a quick and accurate assessment of regional ecological environmental quality (EEQ) and driving mechanisms. To address this issue, this study has developed a remote-sensing ecological index with salinity adaptability (RSEISI) for EEQ assessment in the Tarim River Basin by integrating the comprehensive salinity index (CSI) into the remote-sensing ecological index (RSEI). The RSEISI enhances the sensitivity of soil salinity and characterizes the surface features of arid regions, thus expanding the applicability. Then, we used time-series analysis methods and a geodetector to quantify the spatial temporal trends and driving factors of EEQ in the TRB from 2000 to 2022. The results show that the RSEISI with salinity adaptation effectively monitors the EEQ of the TRB. The EEQ of the TRB displayed the situation of oasis expansion, desert deterioration, and glacier melting, and the multiyear average EEQ grades were dominated by medium and poor grades in desert and saline areas, while medium, good, and excellent grades were concentrated in oasis and mountainous areas. Looking at the trend of change in conjunction with land-use types, the EEQ of the TRB showed a mild degradation trend mainly in unused land, followed by a mild improvement trend in cropland and grassland. The Hurst index indicated that the EEQ of most areas of the TRB will improve in the future. Soil type, land use, precipitation, and temperature were considered to be key factors affecting the EEQ across the TRB, and changes in the EEQ were found to be the interaction of multiple factors. This study may provide innovative concepts and methodologies, scientific and technological support for ecological management, and green development models in the northwest arid zone.

One reason for soil degradation is salinization in inland dryland, which poses a substantial threat to arable land productivity. Remote-sensing technology provides a rapid and accurate assessment for soil salinity monitoring, but there is a lack of high-resolution remote-sensing spatial salinity estimations. The PlanetScope satellite array provides high-precision mapping for land surface monitoring through its 3-m spatial resolution and near-daily revisiting frequency. This study’s use of the PlanetScope satellite array is a new attempt to estimate soil salinity in inland drylands. We hypothesized that field observations, PlanetScope data, and spectral indices derived from the PlanetScope data using the partial least-squares regression (PLSR) method would produce reasonably accurate regional salinity maps based on 84 ground-truth soil salinity data and various spectral parameters, like satellite band reflectance, and published satellite salinity indices. The results showed that using the newly constructed red-edge salinity and yellow band salinity indices, we were able to develop several inversion models to produce regional salinity maps. Different algorithms, including Boruta feature preference, Random Forest algorithm (RF), and Extreme Gradient Boosting algorithm (XGBoost), were applied for variable selection. The newly constructed yellow salinity indices (YRNDSI and YRNDVI) had the best Pearson correlations of 0.78 and −0.78. We also found that the proportions of the newly constructed yellow and red-edge bands accounted for a large proportion of the essential strategies of the three algorithms, with Boruta feature preference at 80%, RF at 80%, and XGBoost at 60%, indicating that these two band indices contributed more to the soil salinity estimation results. The best PLSR model estimation for different strategies is the XGBoost-PLSR model with coefficient of determination (R2), root mean square error (RMSE), and ratio of performance to deviation (RPD) values of 0.832, 12.050, and 2.442, respectively. These results suggest that PlanetScope data has the potential to significantly advance the field of soil salinity research by providing a wealth of fine-scale salinity information.

Detecting and assessing changes in the hydrologic cycle and its response to a changing environment is essential for maintaining regional ecological security and restoring degraded ecosystems. There is no clear scientific evidence on the effects of human activities and climate variability on runoff and its components in typical arid areas. Therefore, in this study, a heuristic segmentation algorithm, a variable infiltration capacity model (VIC), and remote sensing data to quantify the effects of human activities and climate variability on runoff in the catchment of Lake Ebinur, Xinjiang, China. The results found: (1) The heuristic segmentation algorithm divided the study period into reference period (1964-1985) and two impact periods: I (1986-2000) and II (2001-2017). (2) Cropland and forest land showed an increasing trend, with grassland and barren land accounting for most of the increase. At the same time, the leaf area index (LAI) increased by 0.002 per year during the growing season. (3) Compared with the reference period, runoff depth decreased by 108.80 mm in impact period I due to human activities, but increased by 110.5 mm due to climate variability, resulting in an overall increase in runoff depth of 1.72 mm. Runoff depth increased by 11.10 mm in the impact period II compared to the reference period, with climate variability resulting in an increase of 154.40 mm, but human activities resulted in a decrease of 143.30 mm. Our results shed light on decision-making related to water stress in changing circumstances in arid regions.

Although understanding the carbon and water cycles of dryland ecosystems in terms of water use efficiency (WUE) is important, WUE and its driving mechanisms are less understood in Central Asia. This study calculated Central Asian WUE for 2001–2021 based on the Google Earth Engine (GEE) platform and analyzed its spatial and temporal variability using temporal information entropy. The importance of atmospheric factors, hydrological factors, and biological factors in driving WUE in Central Asia was also explored using a geographic detector. The results show the following: (1) the average WUE in Central Asia from 2001–2021 is 2.584–3.607 gCkg−1H2O, with weak inter-annual variability and significant intra-annual variability and spatial distribution changes; (2) atmospheric and hydrological factors are strong drivers, with land surface temperature (LST) being the strongest driver of WUE, explaining 54.8% of variation; (3) the interaction of the driving factors can enhance the driving effect by more than 60% for the interaction between most atmospheric factors and vegetation factors, of which the effect of the interaction of temperature (TEM) with vegetation cover (FVC) is the greatest, explaining 68.1% of the change in WUE. Furthermore, the interaction of driving factors with very low explanatory power (e.g., water pressure (VAP), aerosol optical depth over land (AOD), and groundwater (GWS)) has a significant enhancement effect. Vegetation is an important link in driving WUE, and it is important to understand the mechanisms of WUE change to guide ecological restoration projects.

In order to obtain the unique properties of graphene-based composites, to realize homogeneous dispersion of graphene throughout the polymer matrix remains the key challenge. In this work, edge-oxidized graphene/polypropylene (EOGr/PP) composites with well-dispersed EOGr in PP matrix, synchronously exhibiting high electrical conductivity and thermal property, were simply fabricated for the first time using a novel strategy by in situ artificial PP latex preparation in the presence of EOGr based on solution-emulsification technique. The good dispersion state of EOGr in the PP matrix was demonstrated by means of X-ray diffraction (XRD), transmission electron microscopy (TEM), and scanning electron microscopy (SEM). A blue shift in Raman G peak of the EOGr nanosheets was observed in the EOGr/PP composites, indicating the strong interactions between the EOGr nanosheets and the PP matrix. The onset crystallization and crystallization peak temperatures increased as the EOGr loading increases due to its good nucleating ability. An improved thermal stability of EOGr/PP composites was observed as evaluated by TGA. The EOGr/PP composites showed an insulator-to-conductor percolation transition in between that of 1 and 2 wt% EOGr content. Such strategy provides a very effective pathway to fabricate high-performance nonpolar polymer/graphene composites with excellent dispersion state of graphene.

Soil organic carbon (SOC), as the largest carbon pool on the land surface, plays an important role in soil quality, ecological security and the global carbon cycle. Multisource remote sensing data-driven modeling strategies are not well understood for accurately mapping soil organic carbon. Here, we hypothesized that the Sentinel-2 Multispectral Sensor Instrument (MSI) data-driven modeling strategy produced superior outcomes compared to modeling based on Landsat 8 Operational Land Imager (OLI) data due to the finer spatial and spectral resolutions of the Sentinel-2A MSI data. To test this hypothesis, the Ebinur Lake wetland in Xinjiang was selected as the study area. In this study, SOC estimation was carried out using Sentinel-2A and Landsat 8 data, combining climatic variables, topographic factors, index variables and Sentinel-1A data to construct a common variable model for Sentinel-2A data and Landsat 8 data, and a full variable model for Sentinel-2A data, respectively. We utilized ensemble learning algorithms to assess the prediction performance of modeling strategies, including random forest (RF), gradient boosted decision tree (GBDT) and extreme gradient boosting (XGBoost) algorithms. The results show that: (1) The Sentinel-2A model outperformed the Landsat 8 model in the prediction of SOC contents, and the Sentinel-2A full variable model under the XGBoost algorithm achieved the best results R2 = 0.804, RMSE = 1.771, RPIQ = 2.687). (2) The full variable model of Sentinel-2A with the addition of the red-edge band and red-edge index improved R2 by 6% and 3.2% over the common variable Landsat 8 and Sentinel-2A models, respectively. (3) In the SOC mapping of the Ebinur Lake wetland, the areas with higher SOC content were mainly concentrated in the oasis, while the mountainous and lakeside areas had lower SOC contents. Our results provide a program to monitor the sustainability of terrestrial ecosystems through a satellite perspective.

Rapid and accurate mapping of the spatial distribution of cotton fields is helpful to ensure safe production of cotton fields and the rationalization of land-resource planning. As cotton is an important economic pillar in Xinjiang, accurate and efficient mapping of cotton fields helps the implementation of rural revitalization strategy in Xinjiang region. In this paper, based on the Google Earth Engine cloud computing platform, we use a random forest machine-learning algorithm to classify Landsat 5 and 8 and Sentinel 2 satellite images to obtain the spatial distribution characteristics of cotton fields in 2011, 2015 and 2020 in the Ogan-Kucha River oasis, Xinjiang. Unlike previous studies, the mulching process was considered when using cotton field phenology information as a classification feature. The results show that both Landsat 5, Landsat 8 and Sentinel 2 satellites can successfully classify cotton field information when the mulching process is considered, but Sentinel 2 satellite classification results have the best user accuracy of 0.947. Sentinel 2 images can distinguish some cotton fields from roads well because they have higher spatial resolution than Landsat 8. After the cotton fields were mulched, there was a significant increase in spectral reflectance in the visible, red-edge and near-infrared bands, and a decrease in the short-wave infrared band. The increase in the area of oasis cotton fields and the extensive use of mulched drip-irrigation water saving facilities may lead to a decrease in the groundwater level. Overall, the use of mulch as a phenological feature for classification mapping is a good indicator in cotton-growing areas covered by mulch, and mulch drip irrigation may lead to a decrease in groundwater levels in oases in arid areas.

Biodegradable poly(lactic acid)/poly(propylene carbonate) (PLA/PPC) blends with balanced strength, ductility, and heat resistance were prepared by combining the modification of 30 wt% PPC and uniaxial pre-stretching at 60°C. The undrawn PLA/PPC blend fractured in a brittle way due to the network structure composed of cohesional entanglements. After pre-stretching, the elongation at break was increased to 229.4% at pre-stretching ratio (PSR) of only 0.5, which should be attributed to the destruction of the network structure of cohesional entanglements and the orientation of PPC component in PLA matrix. With the increase of PSR, the modulus, strength at yielding, and break were improved obviously (2433.4, 76.1, and 98.3 MPa at PSR = 2.5) whereas the elongation at break (51.7% at PSR = 2.5) reduced gradually because of the formation of orientation, mesophase, and crystal phase. However, the elongation at break was still larger than that of neat PLA (6.8%) and undrawn PLA/PPC blend (12.3%), indicating that the uniaxial pre-stretching was an effect way to strengthen and toughen PLA blends. Significantly, the heat resistance of ps-PLA/PPC blend was increased obviously with increasing the PSR, which will promote the widespread application of the blends. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]