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"Iraq Maps."
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Predicting Land Use/Land Cover Changes Using a CA-Markov Model under Two Different Scenarios
Multi-temporal Landsat images from Landsat 5 Thematic Mapper (TM) acquired in 1993, 1998, 2003 and 2008 and Landsat 8 Operational Land Imager (OLI) from 2017, are used for analysing and predicting the spatio-temporal distributions of land use/land cover (LULC) categories in the Halgurd-Sakran Core Zone (HSCZ) of the National Park in the Kurdistan region of Iraq. The aim of this article was to explore the LULC dynamics in the HSCZ to assess where LULC changes are expected to occur under two different business-as-usual (BAU) assumptions. Two scenarios have been assumed in the present study. The first scenario, addresses the BAU assumption to show what would happen if the past trend in 1993–1998–2003 has continued until 2023 under continuing the United Nations (UN) sanctions against Iraq and particularly Kurdistan region, which extended from 1990 to 2003. Whereas, the second scenario represents the BAU assumption to show what would happen if the past trend in 2003–2008–2017 has to continue until 2023, viz. after the end of UN sanctions. Future land use changes are simulated to the year 2023 using a Cellular Automata (CA)-Markov chain model under two different scenarios (Iraq under siege and Iraq after siege). Four LULC classes were classified from Landsat using Random Forest (RF). Their accuracy was evaluated using κ and overall accuracy. The CA-Markov chain method in TerrSet is applied based on the past trends of the land use changes from 1993 to 1998 for the first scenario and from 2003 to 2008 for the second scenario. Based on this model, predicted land use maps for the 2023 are generated. Changes between two BAU scenarios under two different conditions have been quantitatively as well as spatially analysed. Overall, the results suggest a trend towards stable and homogeneous areas in the next 6 years as shown in the second scenario. This situation will have positive implication on the park.
Journal Article
Atlas of the ancient Near East : from prehistoric times to the Roman imperial period
This atlas provides students and scholars with a broad range of information on the development of the Ancient Near East from prehistoric times through the beginning of written records in the Near East (c. 3000 BC) to the late Roman Empire and the rise of Islam. The geographical coverage of the Atlas extends from the Aegean coast of Anatolia in the west through Iran and Afghanistan to the east, and from the Black and Caspian Seas in the north to Arabia and the Persian Gulf and Indian Ocean in the south. The Atlas of the Ancient Near East includes a wide-ranging overview of the civilizations and kingdoms discussed, written in a lively and engaging style, which considers not only political and military issues but also introduces the reader to social and cultural topics such as trade, religion, how people were educated and entertained, and much more. With a comprehensive series of detailed maps, supported by the authors' commentary and illustrations of major sites and key artifacts, this title is an invaluable resource for students who wish to understand the fascinating cultures of the Ancient Near East.
Book
Water resources management and sustainability over the Western desert of Iraq
In this research, a comprehensive survey of water resources management and sustainability was conducted over the Western desert of Iraq. A modeling was performed using both remote sensing and numerical analytical tools. Field measurements of hydrological and hydrogeological variables were used to assess surface and groundwater resources. The watershed modeling system was used to identify the existing ponds in the region and to determine their topographical and geometric characteristics based on the digital elevation models. In this study, an annual water harvesting rate was determined for each basin of the studied area, and the annual rate of all the ponds was about 8000 m3/km2. New prominent areas were identified in the field of water harvesting in which water can be exploited for various agricultural uses and the establishment of communities. The second part of water resources is groundwater resources where the amount of renewable and non-renewable groundwater in the region was estimated at more than 30 billion cubic meters. The maps obtained from the Geological Survey were used to identify important groundwater aquifers in the region and to prepare a table of promising areas for investment in future strategic projects. A group of preferred areas was identified as part of the medium-term investment plan for different uses and for safe extraction of groundwater around the province at an approximate annual rate of a billion cubic meter which is equal to the annual recharge rate of groundwater.
Journal Article
Flood Analysis Using HEC-RAS and HEC-HMS: A Case Study of Khazir River (Middle East—Northern Iraq)
Floods frequently threaten villages near the Khazir River’s floodplains, causing crop losses and threatening residential areas. We used flood-related hydrological software, including WMS and HEC-HMS, to study this issue and determine how to reduce the recurrence of flooding. The software can be used to calculate a hydrograph of torrential flows in a river drainage basin and estimate the volume of torrential water and its flow rates on the Earth’s surface. The depth of rain has been evaluated and calculated in the SCS Unit Hydrograph for different return periods of 2, 5, 10, 20, 50, and 100 years. According to our study’s findings, the volume of the river’s drainage basin floods ranged between 29,680 and 2,229,200 m3, and the maximum flow value ranged between 10.4 and 66.4 m3/sec during various reference periods. To analyze and model the flood risks of the Khazir River, the HEC-RAS model was combined with the HEC-GeoRAS extension in ArcGIS. The floods were the focus of two study periods, 2013 and 2018, and were based on the digital elevation model and river discharge during the floods. According to the classification map of the flood depths, the areas of flood risk varied from low to very low (80.31%), medium (16.03%), and high to very high (3.8%). The analysis of the results revealed that the villages closest to the river’s mouth were more affected by the floods than other villages further downstream. HEC-HMS and HEC-RAS have been shown to have a strong correlation in evaluating flood risks and reliably forecasting future floods in the study area.
Journal Article
Spatial modeling of land use and land cover change in Sulaimani, Iraq, using multitemporal satellite data
Land use/land cover (LULC) change is an important indicator used for assessing the function and health of ecosystems. Understanding the patterns of LULC change assists in managing natural resources effectively, especially for regions where there are minimal or no reported data on the status of LULC. In this study, remotely sensed Landsat satellite imagery from 5 years (i.e., 1988, 1996, 2002, 2008, and 2017), geographic information systems (GIS), and the hybrid cellular automata (CA)-Markov model were used to (i) quantify the past and present LULC changes and (ii) model the future changes in Sulaimani Province in the Kurdistan region of Iraq (KRI). To accomplish these objectives, five LULC maps with various class categories were generated using the maximum likelihood classifier (MCL). The classified maps for 1996, 2002, 2008, and 2017 were used in the hybrid model to simulate LULC maps for 2017 and 2037. The map simulated for 2017 was validated with the classified 2017 LULC map. The change analysis demonstrated that between 1988 and 2017, the built-up areas and agricultural fallow land increased by 419% and 226%, respectively. In the future predictions for 2037, built-up areas and agricultural fallow land showed increasing trends of 5.5% and 26.5%, respectively. In contrast, agricultural land, plantation land, and sparse vegetation areas were predicted to decrease by 29.4%, 65.8%, and 36.9%, respectively. In addition, in 2008, waterbodies shrank by 43.36% in comparison with their status in 1988, suggesting that 2008 was a severe drought year. These findings provide invaluable baseline information with which conservation biologists, agricultural engineers, urban planners, and decision makers can better manage natural resources and monitor environmental changes. Based on these results, sustainable development actions and an early warning system can be established.
Journal Article
Applying Built-Up and Bare-Soil Indices from Landsat 8 to Cities in Dry Climates
Arid and semi-arid regions have different spectral characteristics from other climatic regions. Therefore, appropriate remotely sensed indicators of land use and land cover types need to be defined for arid and semi-arid lands, as indices developed for other climatic regions may not give plausible results in arid and semi-arid regions. For instance, the normalized difference built-up index (NDBI) and normalized difference bareness index (NDBaI) are unable to distinguish between built-up areas and bare and dry soil that surrounds many cities in dry climates. This paper proposes the application of two newly developed indices, the dry built-up index (DBI) and dry bare-soil index (DBSI) to map built-up and bare areas in a dry climate from Landsat 8. The developed DBI and DBSI were applied to map urban areas and bare soil in the city of Erbil, Iraq. The results show an overall classification accuracy of 93% (κ = 0.86) and 92% (κ = 0.84) for DBI and DBSI, respectively. The results indicate the suitability of the proposed indices to discriminate between urban areas and bare soil in arid and semi-arid climates.
Journal Article
From Trends to Drivers: Vegetation Degradation and Land-Use Change in Babil and Al-Qadisiyah, Iraq (2000–2023)
Land degradation in Iraq’s Mesopotamian plain threatens food security and rural livelihoods, yet the relative roles of climatic water deficits versus anthropogenic pressures remain poorly attributed in space. We test the hypothesis that multi-timescale climatic water deficits (SPEI-03/-06/-12) exert a stronger effect on vegetation degradation risk than anthropogenic pressures, conditional on hydrological connectivity and irrigation. Using Babil and Al-Qadisiyah (2000–2023) as a case, we implement a four-part pipeline: (i) Fractional Vegetation Cover with Mann–Kendall/Sen’s slope to quantify greening/browning trends; (ii) LandTrendr to extract disturbance timing and magnitude; (iii) annual LULC maps from a Random Forest classifier to resolve transitions; and (iv) an XGBoost classifier to map degradation risk and attribute climate vs. anthropogenic influence via drop-group permutation (ΔAUC), grouped SHAP shares, and leave-group-out ablation, all under spatial block cross-validation. Driver attribution shows mid-term and short-term drought (SPEI-06, SPEI-03) as the strongest predictors, and conditional permutation yields a larger average AUC loss for the climate block than for the anthropogenic block, while grouped SHAP shares are comparable between the two, and ablation suggests a neutral to weak anthropogenic edge. The XGBoost model attains AUC = 0.884 (test) and maps 9.7% of the area as high risk (>0.70), concentrated away from perennial water bodies. Over 2000–2023, LULC change indicates CA +515 km2, HO +129 km2, UL +70 km2, BL −697 km2, WB −16.7 km2. Trend analysis shows recovery across 51.5% of the landscape (+29.6% dec−1 median) and severe decline over 2.5% (−22.0% dec−1). The integrated design couples trend mapping with driver attribution, clarifying how compounded climatic stress and intensive land use shape contemporary desertification risk and providing spatial priorities for restoration and adaptive water management.
Journal Article
Rainfall-Runoff Modeling Using the HEC-HMS Model for the Al-Adhaim River Catchment, Northern Iraq
It has become necessary to estimate the quantities of runoff by knowing the amount of rainfall to calculate the required quantities of water storage in reservoirs and to determine the likelihood of flooding. The present study deals with the development of a hydrological model named Hydrologic Engineering Center (HEC-HMS), which uses Digital Elevation Models (DEM). This hydrological model was used by means of the Geospatial Hydrologic Modeling Extension (HEC-GeoHMS) and Geographical Information Systems (GIS) to identify the discharge of the Al-Adhaim River catchment and embankment dam in Iraq by simulated rainfall-runoff processes. The meteorological models were developed within the HEC-HMS from the recorded daily rainfall data for the hydrological years 2015 to 2018. The control specifications were defined for the specified period and one day time step. The Soil Conservation Service-Curve number (SCS-CN), SCS Unit Hydrograph and Muskingum methods were used for loss, transformation and routing calculations, respectively. The model was simulated for two years for calibration and one year for verification of the daily rainfall values. The results showed that both observed and simulated hydrographs were highly correlated. The model’s performance was evaluated by using a coefficient of determination of 90% for calibration and verification. The dam’s discharge for the considered period was successfully simulated but slightly overestimated. The results indicated that the model is suitable for hydrological simulations in the Al-Adhaim river catchment.
Journal Article
Mapping of Flood-Prone Areas Utilizing GIS Techniques and Remote Sensing: A Case Study of Duhok, Kurdistan Region of Iraq
One of the most common types of natural disaster, floods can happen anywhere on Earth, except in the polar regions. The severity of the damage caused by flooding can be reduced by putting proper management and protocols into place. Using remote sensing and a geospatial methodology, this study attempts to identify flood-vulnerable areas of the central district of Duhok, Iraq. The analytical hierarchy process (AHP) technique was used to give relative weights to 12 contributing parameters, including elevation, slope, distance from the river, rainfall, land use land cover, soil, lithology, topographic roughness index, topographic wetness index, aspect, the sediment transport index, and the stream power index in order to calculate the Flood Hazard Index (FHI). The relative importance of each criterion was revealed by a sensitivity analysis of the parameter values. This research developed a final flood susceptibility map and identified high-susceptible zones. This was classified anywhere from very low to very high classifications for its potential flood hazard. The generated map indicates that 44.72 km2 of the total land area of the study area in Duhok city has a very high susceptibility to flooding, and that these areas require significant attention from government authorities in order to reduce flood vulnerability.
Journal Article