TY - JOUR
T1 - Examining the variation of soil moisture from cosmic-ray neutron probes footprint
T2 - Experimental results from a COSMOS-UK site
AU - Howells, Owen D.
AU - Petropoulos, George P.
AU - Triantakonstantis, Dimitris
AU - Ioannou, Zacharias
AU - Srivastava, Prashant K.
AU - Detsikas, Spyridon E.
AU - Stavroulakis, George
N1 - Funding Information:
GPP’s contribution was supported by a UK Research Council award (STFC ST/N006836/1) and the author gratefully acknowledges the financial support provided by the funding body.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2022, The Author(s).
PY - 2023/1/2
Y1 - 2023/1/2
N2 - Utilising cosmic-ray neutron probes is a relatively new approach in obtaining larger area soil moisture and various operational monitoring networks have been established worldwide utilising this technology to measure operationally this parameter. One such network located in the United Kingdom (UK) is the Cosmic-ray Soil Moisture Observing System, so-called COSMOS-UK, established in 2013. The present study aims at investigating the true footprint and the variations within the footprint detectable area at the COSMOS-UK sites using as a case study one such site located in Riseholme, UK. At the selected experimental site extensive fieldwork was conducted in July 2017 that allowed examining the agreement among the soil moisture data retrieved by the Time Domain Transmissometer (TDT) sensors and the corresponding estimates from the COSMOS-UK network station probe. The COSMOS-UK site footprint was compared using GPS-aided information from ground instrumentation, assisted by drone imagery acquisition and the implementation of geospatial interpolation methods in a Geographical Information System (GIS) environment. Altogether, this information was used for assessing the soil moisture footprint extent from the COSMOS-UK site. The COSMOS-UK station footprint was representative for an area shorter in size than the alleged footprint of 600 m diameter, as generally proposed in various relevant investigations. The COSMOS network slightly overestimated soil moisture content measured by the TDT sensor probes installed in the area. Our study findings although concern specifically the studied experimental site contribute towards efforts aiming at assessing the COSMOS-UK soil moisture measurement footprint showcasing the added value of geospatial analysis in this direction.
AB - Utilising cosmic-ray neutron probes is a relatively new approach in obtaining larger area soil moisture and various operational monitoring networks have been established worldwide utilising this technology to measure operationally this parameter. One such network located in the United Kingdom (UK) is the Cosmic-ray Soil Moisture Observing System, so-called COSMOS-UK, established in 2013. The present study aims at investigating the true footprint and the variations within the footprint detectable area at the COSMOS-UK sites using as a case study one such site located in Riseholme, UK. At the selected experimental site extensive fieldwork was conducted in July 2017 that allowed examining the agreement among the soil moisture data retrieved by the Time Domain Transmissometer (TDT) sensors and the corresponding estimates from the COSMOS-UK network station probe. The COSMOS-UK site footprint was compared using GPS-aided information from ground instrumentation, assisted by drone imagery acquisition and the implementation of geospatial interpolation methods in a Geographical Information System (GIS) environment. Altogether, this information was used for assessing the soil moisture footprint extent from the COSMOS-UK site. The COSMOS-UK station footprint was representative for an area shorter in size than the alleged footprint of 600 m diameter, as generally proposed in various relevant investigations. The COSMOS network slightly overestimated soil moisture content measured by the TDT sensor probes installed in the area. Our study findings although concern specifically the studied experimental site contribute towards efforts aiming at assessing the COSMOS-UK soil moisture measurement footprint showcasing the added value of geospatial analysis in this direction.
KW - COSMOS UK
KW - Geoinformation
KW - Remote sensing
KW - Soil moisture monitoring
KW - Spatial analysis
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85145882507&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1007/s12665-022-10721-1
DO - 10.1007/s12665-022-10721-1
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85145882507
SN - 1866-6280
VL - 82
JO - Environmental Earth Sciences
JF - Environmental Earth Sciences
IS - 1
M1 - 41
ER -