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"Bodies of water."
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Earth's landforms and bodies of water
Learn about Earth's different types of landforms and bodies of water.
Book
Morphological characteristics of urban water bodies: mechanisms of change and implications for ecosystem function
The size, shape, and connectivity of water bodies (lakes, ponds, and wetlands) can have important effects on ecological communities and ecosystem processes, but how these characteristics are influenced by land use and land cover change over broad spatial scales is not known. Intensive alteration of water bodies during urban development, including construction, burial, drainage, and reshaping, may select for certain morphometric characteristics and influence the types of water bodies present in cities. We used a database of over one million water bodies in 100 cities across the conterminous United States to compare the size distributions, connectivity (as intersection with surface flow lines), and shape (as measured by shoreline development factor) of water bodies in different land cover classes. Water bodies in all urban land covers were dominated by lakes and ponds, while reservoirs and wetlands comprised only a small fraction of the sample. In urban land covers, as compared to surrounding undeveloped land, water body size distributions converged on moderate sizes, shapes toward less tortuous shorelines, and the number and area of water bodies that intersected surface flow lines (i.e., streams and rivers) decreased. Potential mechanisms responsible for changing the characteristics of urban water bodies include: preferential removal, physical reshaping or addition of water bodies, and selection of locations for development. The relative contributions of each mechanism likely change as cities grow. The larger size and reduced surface connectivity of urban water bodies may affect the role of internal dynamics and sensitivity to catchment processes. More broadly, these results illustrate the complex nature of urban watersheds and highlight the need to develop a conceptual framework for urban water bodies.
Journal Article
Rivers
Explores some of the biggest and coolest rivers in the world, including the Amazon and the Nile, describing each river's environment and wildlife.
Book
Biogeochemistry of organic carbon, CO₂, CH₄, and trace elements in thermokarst water bodies in discontinuous permafrost zones of Western Siberia
Active processes of permafrost thaw in Western Siberia increase the number of soil subsidencies, thermokarst lakes and thaw ponds. In continuous permafrost zones, this process promotes soil carbon mobilisation to water reservoirs, as well as organic matter (OM) biodegradation, which produces a permanent flux of carbon dioxide (CO₂) to the atmosphere. At the same time, the biogeochemical evolution of aquatic ecosystems situated in the transition zone between continuous permafrost and permafrost-free terrain remains poorly known. In order to better understand the biogeochemical processes that occur in thaw ponds and lakes located in discontinuous permafrost zones, we studied ∼30 small (1–100,000 m₂) shallow (<1 m depth) lakes and ponds formed as a result of permafrost subsidence and thaw of the palsa bog located in the transition zone between the tundra and forest-tundra (central part of Western Siberia). There is a significant increase in dissolved CO₂ and methane (CH₄) concentration with decreasing water body surface area, with the largest supersaturation with respect to atmospheric CO₂ and CH₄ in small (<100 m²) permafrost depressions filled with thaw water. Dissolved organic carbon (DOC), conductivity, and metal concentrations also progressively increase from large lakes to thaw ponds and depressions. As such, small water bodies with surface areas of 1–100 m² that are not accounted for in the existing lake and pond databases may significantly contribute to CO₂ and CH₄ fluxes to the atmosphere, as well as to the stocks of dissolved trace elements and organic carbon. In situ lake water incubation experiments yielded negligible primary productivity but significant oxygen consumption linked to the mineralisation rate of dissolved OM by heterotrophic bacterioplankton, which produce a net CO₂ flux to the atmosphere of 5 ± 2.5 mol C m² year⁻¹. The most significant result of this study, which has long-term consequences on our prediction of aquatic ecosystem development in the course of permafrost degradation is CO₂, CH₄, and DOC concentrations increase with decreasing lake age and size. As a consequence, upon future permafrost thaw, the increase in the number of small water bodies, accompanied by the drainage of large thermokarst lakes to the hydrological network, will likely favour (i) the increase of DOC and colloidal metal stocks in surface aquatic systems, and (ii) the enchancement of CO₂ and CH₄ fluxes from the water surface to the atmosphere. According to a conservative estimation that considers that the total area occupied by water bodies in Western Siberia will not change, this increase in stocks and fluxes could be as high as a factor of ten.
Journal Article
Convergent Surface Water Distributions in U.S. Cities
Earth’s surface is rapidly urbanizing, resulting in dramatic changes in the abundance, distribution and character of surface water features in urban landscapes. However, the scope and consequences of surface water redistribution at broad spatial scales are not well understood. We hypothesized that urbanization would lead to convergent surface water abundance and distribution: in other words, cities will gain or lose water such that they become more similar to each other than are their surrounding natural landscapes. Using a database of more than 1 million water bodies and 1 million km of streams, we compared the surface water of 100 US cities with their surrounding undeveloped land. We evaluated differences in areal (A WB) and numeric densities (N WB) of water bodies (lakes, wetlands, and so on), the morphological characteristics of water bodies (size), and the density (D C) of surface flow channels (that is, streams and rivers). The variance of urban A WB, N WB, and D C across the 100 MSAs decreased, by 89, 25, and 71%, respectively, compared to undeveloped land. These data show that many cities are surface water poor relative to undeveloped land; however, in drier landscapes urbanization increases the occurrence of surface water. This convergence pattern strengthened with development intensity, such that high intensity urban development had an areal water body density 98% less than undeveloped lands. Urbanization appears to drive the convergence of hydrological features across the US, such that surface water distributions of cities are more similar to each other than to their surrounding landscapes.
Journal Article
Wisconsin Waters
Every Wisconsin waterway has a story, from the Great Lakes and the Mighty Mississippi to thousands of interior lakes, rivers, and trout streams.Wisconsin Waters takes readers on an epic tour of the geologic, natural, and human stories that have shaped these aquatic landscapes over millions of years.
eBook
Water : discovering the precious resource all around us
\"This browsable nonfiction book explores water at work in our world, from the Great Lakes to rainstorms to sea gods to the water in our taps\"-- Provided by publisher.
Book
nitrogen budget of mainland China with spatial and temporal variation
The present study evaluated nitrogen (N) input and output in mainland China using updated data of temporally and spatially-based land use maps and statistical data at national and provincial scales. The total N inputs increased from 3,081 kg km−2 in 1985 to 5,426 kg km−2 in 2007. Chemical fertilizer dominated the N input and showed an increasing trend. Biological N fixation was the second important N input till 1990 and atmospheric deposition became the second most important source after that, accounting for 24.0% in 2007. There was no net N input through food/feed import in 1985, but it accounted for 3.5% of the total N input in 2007. According to a mass balance model, we assumed total N input equal to output. The results showed that more than half of the total N was denitrified or stored in the system. Ammonia volatilization accounted for 18.9–22.9% of the total N input, and N export to water bodies accounted for 17.9–20.7%. About 5.1–7.7% of the N input was emitted to the atmosphere through biomass burning. When calculated per unit area, total N input, N export to water bodies, denitrification and storage could be very well explained by human population density. Nitrogen input and major outputs were also positively related to per capita gross domestic product and the percentage of total land area used as cropland. The N budget is compared to that of some other countries and the environmental impacts of the N cycle is discussed.
Journal Article