Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons^™

Moisture Dynamics Of A Near-Surface Desert Soil, Yuan Luo

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Desert soils cover about one third of the Earth’s land surface. Despite their large extent, however, our understanding of desert soil hydraulic processes and properties is still rather limited. In particularly with respect to the near-surface (top centimeters) of the soil profile, which play a critical role for infiltration, redistribution and evapotranspiration of rainwater, the limiting resource for life in desert environments, but also hosts most of the biologic activity and controls runoff, erosion as well as the emission of dust (Nannipieri et al.,2003; Bradford et al.,1987). Additionally, deserts are ideal locations for electricity generation with solar energy using large-scale …