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Oceanography and Atmospheric Sciences and Meteorology

University of Arkansas, Fayetteville

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Drought

Articles 1 - 6 of 6

Full-Text Articles in Physical Sciences and Mathematics

Data Analytics For Sustainable Food And Agriculture Systems, Megan Lord Reavis Dec 2021

Data Analytics For Sustainable Food And Agriculture Systems, Megan Lord Reavis

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The increasing concentration of anthropogenic greenhouse gases in the atmosphere is altering the climate, posing a serious threat to global agriculture and food security. Agriculture and food production contribute a quarter of all GHG emissions produced, so there is a critical need to limit emissions in this area while increasing food production to feed the anticipated 10 billion people by 2050. To address the needs of the future, data-driven solutions are needed to guide decision-making and provide support for actionable climate mitigation and survival strategies. Research efforts must be focused on analyzing problems on multiple scales, identifying new ways to …


Ecological Importance Of Invader Source Population And Disturbance In Aquatic Invasions, Nicole Elizabeth Graham May 2017

Ecological Importance Of Invader Source Population And Disturbance In Aquatic Invasions, Nicole Elizabeth Graham

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Invasive species are a global problem and their effects on recipient ecosystems may be mediated by disturbance and intraspecific variation. Crayfish can substantially influence stream structure and function, and invasive crayfish often have differential impacts than native crayfish in aquatic ecosystems. Since species traits often vary across a distribution, it is possible that invasive crayfish from different source populations may have distinct impacts on recipient ecosystem structure and function. In the Ozark Highlands of Arkansas and Missouri, USA, invasive O. neglectus (the Ringed Crayfish) may be leading to the displacement of native O. eupunctus (the Coldwater Crayfish). The objective of …


Agro-Climatic Change, Crop Production And Mitigation Strategies-Case Studies In Arkansas, Usa And Kenya, John Westley Magugu Aug 2016

Agro-Climatic Change, Crop Production And Mitigation Strategies-Case Studies In Arkansas, Usa And Kenya, John Westley Magugu

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Although climate change impacts vary geographically and temporally, studies at local levels are not readily available for stakeholders to better understand how their local communities would be affected and what remedial measures could be more effective in their local contexts. This dissertation has examined climate change and its impacts in two different local contexts: eastern Arkansas in the USA and Nyando in Kenya. The first part of this dissertation develops agro-meteorological indicators and examines the relationship between agro-meteorological indicators and crop yields in eastern Arkansas between 1960 and 2014. Results reveal that temperature based indicators were more strongly correlated to …


Geospatial Analysis Of Droughts, Rice And Wheat Production, And Agrarian Vulnerability: A District-Level Study Of The Self-Calibrated Palmer Drought Severity Index In India, Aaron Michael Shew May 2016

Geospatial Analysis Of Droughts, Rice And Wheat Production, And Agrarian Vulnerability: A District-Level Study Of The Self-Calibrated Palmer Drought Severity Index In India, Aaron Michael Shew

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Droughts have affected more people than any other natural disaster in the last century, causing billions in economic damages and millions of deaths. As the Sea Surface Temperatures (SST) have heated in the Indian Ocean, drought patterns across South Asia have changed; the Indian monsoon has become more volatile and less predictable. In this study, monthly self-calibrated Palmer Drought Severity Index (sc-PDSI) data for the time period between 1950 and 2009 were interpolated to India’s districts; then the data were analyzed for changes in frequency and severity. The data were further evaluated using Anselin’s Local Moran’s I Statistic to elicit …


Modifying A Cow-Calf Biophysical Simulation Model For Analyses Of Alternative Enterprises, Jennifer L. Lutes Dec 2015

Modifying A Cow-Calf Biophysical Simulation Model For Analyses Of Alternative Enterprises, Jennifer L. Lutes

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Cow-calf producers in the United States, tasked with providing beef calves for the beef industry, have had a multitude of difficulties to overcome in recent years. Producers in northwest Arkansas were negatively impacted by high hay prices coupled with low beef cattle market prices due to severe drought experienced in portions of 2010, 2011, and 2012. During this time they also faced high grain prices, due to a record low harvest, combined with portions of the corn harvest diverted from human and animal feed to ethanol production. Tight lending policies of this time, reminiscent of the housing market crash in …


A Daily Temperature Record For Central Texas, 1896-2011, Matthew Kain Taylor Aug 2012

A Daily Temperature Record For Central Texas, 1896-2011, Matthew Kain Taylor

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

A continuous record of 882,693 daily maximum, minimum, and mean temperature measurements for seven weather stations in central Texas dating from August 1, 1896, to August 31, 2011, were screened and corrected for missing values and inhomogeneities. The resulting data were averaged to create a 115-year unbroken regional record of daily temperature for central Texas. This record indicates warming in daily, seasonal, and annual temperatures. Winter warm temperature extremes have increased over the period of record while warm temperature extremes during the summer months have remained largely unchanged. Summer heat wave days and the length of heat waves have increased …