Local level rainfall and temperature variability in drought-prone districts of rural Sidama,central rift valley region of Ethiopia

ABSTRACT

The purpose of this study is to examine local level spatiotemporal rainfall and temperature variability in drought-prone districts of rural Sidama, Central Rift Valley region of Ethiopia. The study used 129 gridded monthly rainfall and temperature data of 32 years (1983–2014). The gridded rainfall and temperature records were encoded into GIS software and evaluated through different statistical and geospatial techniques. Mann-Kendal rank test and F distribution tests were used to test temporal and spatial statistical significance, respectively, of the data. The analysis revealed that Belg and Kiremt are the main rainfall seasons, constituting 81% of the annual rainfall. Although annual, Kiremt, and Belg rainfall amounts appear to have decreased over time, the decreasing trend is statistically significant only for Belg rainfall records. On the other hand, rainfall standard anomaly results indicated seven droughts of different magnitudes: one extreme, two severe, and four moderate. The study also revealed increasing temperature trends over the years under consideration that are statistically significant. The findings of this study on rainfall contradict other findings obtained around the study area. Thus, climate change adaptations need to focus on location-specific climate data analysis so that the intended adaptive interventions can be successful.     

基于灯光数据的京津冀城市多标度异速分析

城镇体系的时空演化是一个复杂的动力学过程,具有无尺度性,其特征可以采用异速标度指数定量描述。论文以京津冀为例,基于1992—2013年夜间灯光数据的校正结果,提取城镇夜间灯光信息,采用多标度异速分析方法,分析京津冀城镇体系的相对发展特征及其空间分异格局。研究发现：①京津冀大城市的增长空间局限日益显著。虽然大城市如京津唐的绝对发展水平高,但接近环境承载量的极限,22 a间增长快速的是大城市交接地带的小城市(如三河、迁安、廊坊等)。②相对增长速度快的城市从东北到西南呈现带状分布——政府选择发展的“雄安新区”就在这个轴带上。由此可以得出两个结论：其一,京津冀城市演化的趋势相对均衡化,空间结构异质性逐步减弱,整个城镇体系的发展趋于相对平衡状态;其二,大、小城市“两极”贯通或许是增强城镇体系功能的有效途径。京津冀的空间格局优化不能仅仅考虑主要的、规模大的中心城市,而应该基于等级结构协调整个城镇网络体系。     

京津冀协同发展重要地理国情监测研究与应用

文章阐述了开展京津冀协同发展重要地理国情监测的现实背景和意义,依托地理国情普查和常态化监测,结合京津冀一体化发展需求,提出了京津冀协同发展重要地理国情监测的总体思路、研究内容、关键技术和研究方法等,并开展了京津冀地区自然生态空间变化监测、高等级公路和铁路交通网络变化监测、重点大气颗粒物污染源空间分布监测等重要地理国情信息监测研究,成果已经在京津冀地区可持续发展评价、京津冀生态文明建设、空间规划管理等工作中得到了广泛应用。     

路网约束条件下热力规则设计与试验

热力图是一种能直观准确展示空间观测值的有效工具，在多个领域具有广泛应用。本文在分析设定不同道路层权重、道路技术等级分类的基础上，以反距离权重、直方图均衡化、密度补偿、参数多次迭代等方法，研究构建了以热力方式展示道路网分布及发达程度的相关规则体系。热力规则通过道路赋权、路线曲面化、密度协调、图面综合等多套规则的有机结合，实现了道路网总体发达水平信息的提取与展示，并以全球地理信息资源建设项目路网成果中的亚洲和非洲部分国家数据为例，进行了信息提取与热力分布试验。     

Species Diversity Characteristics of a Natural Pinus taiwanensis Community with Different Diameter Classes and Forest Densities

Pinus taiwanensis is a species endemic to China. This study selected four typical plots of Pinus taiwanensis in the natural secondary forest around Macheng City, in order to reveal the characteristics of and the relationships between different diameter classes (determined based on the diameter at breast height or DBH), forest densities and species diversity, as well as the similarities of species diversity of different plots within the community. The result showed that Pinus taiwanensis was the dominant species in the community. The ratio of Pinus taiwanensis trees of diameter class IV reached a peak of 19.46% of the total followed by diameter class VII at 18.92%. The study recorded 156 species of vascular plants from 130 genera of 71 families; Pinus taiwanensis was the dominant species in the community. When the forest density was 1200 trees ha ^-1 with the largest average diameter of DBH=36.779±4.444 cm, the diversity (Shannon index H'=1.6716) and the evenness (Pielou index E=0.6727) of the tree layer was the highest. When the forest density reached 1525 trees ha ^-1 with the lowest average diameter of DBH=18.957±5.141 cm, the richness (D_ma=5.4308), the diversity (H'=2.9612) and the evenness (E=0.8985) of all shrub layers climbed to the maximum. When the forest density was 1325 trees ha ^-1, the richness (D_ma=5.8132), the diversity (H'=3.0697) and the evenness (E=0.9025) of all herb layers peaked. In terms of vertical structure, the average diversity indexes were herb layer>shrub layer>tree layer. High canopy density weakened light intensity in the community, causing a reduction in the species diversities of herbs and shrubs. The average similarity coefficient between the sample plots was 0.3356, which was at the medium dissimilarity level. External disturbances and improper management were major contributors to the low species diversity of the community. The implementation of scientific management measures is urgently needed to optimize the forest structures of Pinus taiwanensis, create a benign community environment, and promote species diversities and establish a stable forest community structure.     

Gamma-Hadron Separation using Čerenkov Photon Density Fluctuations

In the atmospheric Čerenkov technique γ-rays are detected against the abundant background produced by hadronic showers. In order to improve the signal to noise ratio of theexperiment, it is necessary to reject a significant fraction of hadronic showers. Traditional background rejection methods based on image shape parameters have been extensively used for the data from imaging telescopes. However, non-imaging Čerenkov telescopes have to develop very different means of statistically identifying and removing cosmic ray events. Some of the parameters, which could be potentially important for non-imaging arrays, are the temporal and spectral differences, the lateral distributions and density fluctuations of Čerenkov photons generated by γ-ray and hadron primaries. Here we study the differences in fluctuations of Čerenkov photon density in the light pool at the observation level from showers initiated by photons and those initiated by protons or heavier nuclei. The database of simulated events for the PACT array has been used to evaluate the efficiency of the new technique. Various types of density fluctuations like the short range and medium range fluctuations as well as flatness parameter are studied. The estimated quality factors reflect the efficiencies with which the hadrons can be rejected from the data. Since some of these parameters are independent, the cuts may be applied in tandem and we demonstrate that the proton rejection efficiency of ∼90% can be achieved. Use of density fluctuations is particularly suited for wavefront sampling observations and it seems to be a good technique to improve the signal to noise ratio. This revised version was published online in July 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

南山站对陆地—5号资源卫星的可观测范围及以该站为中心的覆盖区域

本文简要介绍了陆地系列地球资源卫星的轨道特征，并以陆地—５号资源卫星为例，根据南山站的座标计算出该站对陆地—５号资源卫星的可观测范围及以该站为中心的卫星的覆盖区域。     

利用自回归模型检测地球极移重力效应

同时采用4个台站的国际超导重力仪长期连续重力观测资料和国际地球自转服务中心提供的同步地球自转参数，研究了极移引起的地球重力场变化特征。利用自回归模型估计了各序列的功率谱密度和积谱密度，结果表明极移导致的重力效应的主要能量集中在Chandler摆动和周年项附近，叠积后实际重力观测与极移重力信号理论值之间的差异分别为0．4％和3．9％，说明超导重力仪可有效监测极移导致的重力变化。     

A critical state model for sands dependent on stress and density

An elastoplastic model for sands is presented in this paper, which can describe stress–strain behaviour dependent on mean effective stress level and void ratio. The main features of the proposed model are: (a) a new state parameter, which is dependent on the initial void ratio and initial mean stress, is proposed and applied to the yield function in order to predict the plastic deformation for very loose sands; and (b) another new state parameter, which is used to determine the peak strength and describe the critical state behaviour of sands during shearing, is proposed in order to predict simply negative/positive dilatancy and the hardening/softening behaviour of medium or dense sands. In addition, the proposed model can also predict the stress–strain behaviour of sands under three-dimensional stress conditions by using a transformed stress tensor instead of ordinary stress tensor. Copyright © 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

GRADATION AND ASSESSMENT OF DAMAGE DEGREE OF NATURAL LANDSCAPE IN XING, AN COUNTY, GUANGXI

A new technique designed to help quantify the degree of damage to the landscape from one area to another shows a close relationship between population density and the degree of landscape damage. The technique establishes a scale of damage from 0 to 5 (zero = no damage; 5 = severe damage) using data from aerial photographs, land-use maps, and field data. The related formula allows one to compare the relative degree of damage across regions using a combination of an absolute index, a theoretical index, a relative index, and population density. Xing'an County is used to demonstrate the technique.