Estimating Soil Hydraulic Properties from Infrared Measurements of Soil Surface Temperatures and TDR Data

The spatiotemporal development of soil surface temperatures (SST) depends on water availability in the near-surface soil layer. Because the soil loses latent heat during evaporation and water available for evaporation depends on soil hydraulic properties (SHP), the temporal variability of SST should contain information about the near-surface SHP. The objective of this study was to investigate the uncertainties of SHP derived from SST. The HYDRUS-1D code coupled with a global optimizer (DREAM) was used to inversely estimate van Genuchten–Mualem parameters from infrared-measured SST and time domain reflectometry (TDR)-measured water contents. This approach was tested using synthetic and real data, collected during September 2008 from a harrowed silty loam field plot in Selhausen, Germany. The synthetic data illustrated that SHP can be derived from SST and that additional soil water content measurements reduce the uncertainty of the estimated SHP. Unlike for the synthetic experiment with a vertically homogeneous soil profile, a layered soil profile had to be assumed to derive SHP from the real data. Therefore, the uncertainty of SHP derived from real data was considerably larger. Water retention curves of undisturbed soil cores were similar to those estimated from SST and TDR data for the deeper undisturbed soil. The retention curves derived from SST and TDR data for the harrowed topsoil layer were typical for a coarse-textured soil and deviated considerably from the retention curves of soil cores, which were typical for a fine-textured soil and similar to those from the subsoil.

[1]  E. E. Miller,et al.  The temperature dependence of isothermal moisture vs. potential characteristics of soils. , 1986 .

[2]  Robert Horton,et al.  Simultaneous Transfer of Heat, Water, and Solute in Porous Media: I. Theoretical Development , 1992 .

[3]  A. P. Annan,et al.  Electromagnetic determination of soil water content: Measurements in coaxial transmission lines , 1980 .

[4]  Cajo J. F. ter Braak,et al.  Treatment of input uncertainty in hydrologic modeling: Doing hydrology backward with Markov chain Monte Carlo simulation , 2008 .

[5]  S. Sorooshian,et al.  A Shuffled Complex Evolution Metropolis algorithm for optimization and uncertainty assessment of hydrologic model parameters , 2002 .

[6]  Wim G.M. Bastiaanssen,et al.  Inversely estimating soil hydraulic functions using evapotranspiration fluxes , 2002 .

[7]  M. Parlange,et al.  On water vapor transport in field soils , 1998 .

[8]  Y. Mualem.  A New Model for Predicting the Hydraulic Conductivity , 1976 .

[9]  Calvin Wyatt Rose,et al.  Water transport in soil with a daily temperature wave. I. Theory and experiment , 1968 .

[10]  Kai-Uwe Goss,et al.  Estimation of water transport based on in situ measurements of relative humidity and temperature in a dry Tanzanian soil , 2007 .

[11]  A. Warrick,et al.  Assessment of Evaporation from Bare Soil by Infrared Thermometry1 , 1983 .

[12]  Bridget R. Scanlon,et al.  Water and heat fluxes in desert soils: 2. Numerical simulations , 1994 .

[13]  K. O. Adekalu,et al.  Tillage effects on bulk density, hydraulic conductivity and strength of a loamy sand soil in southwestern Nigeria , 2005 .

[14]  Cajo J. F. ter Braak,et al.  Equifinality of formal (DREAM) and informal (GLUE) Bayesian approaches in hydrologic modeling? , 2009 .

[15]  R. Reedy,et al.  Variations in flow and transport in thick desert vadose zones in response to paleoclimatic forcing (0–90 kyr): Field measurements, modeling, and uncertainties , 2003 .

[16]  Miroslav Šejna,et al.  Development and Applications of the HYDRUS and STANMOD Software Packages and Related Codes , 2008 .

[17]  Lutz Weihermüller,et al.  Sensitivity of simulated soil heterotrophic respiration to temperature and moisture reduction functions , 2008 .

[18]  Albert Olioso,et al.  Estimation of heat and mass fluxes from IR brightness temperature , 1996, IEEE Trans. Geosci. Remote. Sens..

[19]  Luis A. Bastidas,et al.  Constraining a physically based Soil‐Vegetation‐Atmosphere Transfer model with surface water content and thermal infrared brightness temperature measurements using a multiobjective approach , 2005 .

[20]  Robert Horton,et al.  Water Transport in Unsaturated Nonisothermal Salty Soil: II. Theoretical Development , 1989 .

[21]  Robert Horton,et al.  Soil Heat and Water Flow With a Partial Surface Mulch , 1987 .

[22]  Eleanor J. Burke,et al.  Using a modeling approach to predict soil hydraulic properties from passive microwave measurements , 1998, IEEE Trans. Geosci. Remote. Sens..

[23]  Jirka Simunek,et al.  Indirect estimation of soil thermal properties and water flux using heat pulse probe measurements: Geometry and dispersion effects , 2002 .

[24]  Robert Charlier,et al.  Heat Transfer in Soils , 2009 .

[25]  Peter Lehmann,et al.  Drying front and water content dynamics during evaporation from sand delineated by neutron radiography , 2008 .

[26]  P. Milly.  Moisture and heat transport in hysteretic, inhomogeneous porous media: A matric head‐based formulation and a numerical model , 1982 .

[27]  B. Mohanty,et al.  Root Zone Soil Moisture Assessment Using Remote Sensing and Vadose Zone Modeling , 2006 .

[28]  D. Hillel,et al.  Calculating potential and actual evaporation from a bare soil surface by simulation of concurrent flow of water and heat , 1976 .

[29]  Adriaan A. Van de Griend,et al.  Bare soil surface resistance to evaporation by vapor diffusion under semiarid conditions , 1994 .

[30]  Richard L. Snyder,et al.  Coupling of heat, water vapor, and liquid water fluxes to compute evaporation in bare soils , 2008 .

[31]  Jean-Pierre Wigneron,et al.  Estimation of Evapotranspiration and Photosynthesis by Assimilation of Remote Sensing Data into SVAT Models , 1999 .

[32]  N. Afgan,et al.  Transfer processes in the plant environment , 1975 .

[33]  T. L. Jones,et al.  Enhancement of thermal water vapor diffusion in soil , 1984 .

[34]  A. Klute,et al.  Methods of soil analysis , 2015, American Potato Journal.

[35]  Harry Vereecken,et al.  Sensor‐to‐Sensor Variability of the ECH2O EC‐5, TE, and 5TE Sensors in Dielectric Liquids , 2010 .

[36]  Bridget R. Scanlon,et al.  Numerical Analysis of Coupled Water, Vapor, and Heat Transport in the Vadose Zone , 2005 .

[37]  Kosuke Noborio,et al.  Two‐Dimensional Model for Water, Heat, and Solute Transport in Furrow‐Irrigated Soil: II. Field Evaluation , 1996 .

[38]  J. Philip.  EVAPORATION, AND MOISTURE AND HEAT FIELDS IN THE SOIL , 1957 .

[39]  Robert J. Gurney,et al.  A RESISTANCE PARAMETER FOR BARE‐SOIL EVAPORATION MODELS , 1986 .

[40]  André Chanzy,et al.  Soil evaporation monitoring: a possible synergism of microwave and infrared remote sensing , 1995 .

[41]  P. Milly,et al.  A Simulation Analysis of Thermal Effects on Evaporation From Soil , 1984 .

[42]  W. Mauser,et al.  Modelling the spatial distribution of evapotranspiration on different scales using remote sensing data , 1998 .

[43]  Thomas J. Schmugge,et al.  A soil and atmospheric boundary layer model for evapotranspiration and soil moisture studies , 1983 .

[44]  J. Kondo,et al.  A Parameterization of Evaporation from Bare Soil Surfaces. , 1990 .

[45]  Kun Yang,et al.  Inverse analysis of the role of soil vertical heterogeneity in controlling surface soil state and energy partition , 2005 .

[46]  Jan Vanderborght,et al.  Characterization and Understanding of Bare Soil Respiration Spatial Variability at Plot Scale , 2009 .

[47]  Y. Mualem,et al.  Hysteretical models for prediction of the hydraulic conductivity of unsaturated porous media , 1976 .

[48]  Van Genuchten,et al.  A closed-form equation for predicting the hydraulic conductivity of unsaturated soils , 1980 .

[49]  J. R. Philip,et al.  Moisture movement in porous materials under temperature gradients , 1957 .

[50]  Thomas J. Jackson,et al.  Calibrating a soil water and energy budget model with remotely sensed data to obtain quantitative information about the soil , 1997 .

[51]  P. O’neill,et al.  Estimating Soil Hydraulic Parameters Using Passive Microwave Data , 1986, IEEE Transactions on Geoscience and Remote Sensing.

[52]  D. Batens,et al.  Theory and Experiment , 1988 .

[53]  J. Vrugt,et al.  On the value of soil moisture measurements in vadose zone hydrology: A review , 2008 .

[54]  Kosuke Noborio,et al.  Two‐Dimensional Model for Water, Heat, and Solute Transport in Furrow‐Irrigated Soil: I. Theory , 1996 .

[55]  R. Green,et al.  Temporal variability of soil hydraulic properties with wetting and drying subsequent to tillage , 1986 .

[56]  F. S. Nakayama,et al.  Diurnal Soil-Water Evaporation: Time-Depth-Flux Patterns 1 , 1973 .

[57]  B. Murphy,et al.  Temporal variation of hydraulic properties for some soils with fragile structure , 1993 .

[58]  S. Sorooshian,et al.  Shuffled complex evolution approach for effective and efficient global minimization , 1993 .

[59]  Robert Horton,et al.  Simultaneous Transfer of Heat, Water, and Solute in Porous Media: II. Experiment and Analysis , 1992 .

[60]  C. Rose.  Water transport in soil with a daily temperature wave. II. Analysis , 1968 .

[61]  Gerrit H. de Rooij,et al.  Methods of Soil Analysis. Part 4. Physical Methods , 2004 .

[62]  J. Bonnet.  THE NATURE OF LATERIZATION AS REVEALED BY CHEMICAL, PHYSICAL, AND MINERALOGICAL‐STUDIES OF A LATERITIC SOIL PROFILE FROM PUERTO RICO , 1939 .

[63]  Robert Horton,et al.  Water Transport in Unsaturated Nonisothermal Salty Soil: I. Experimental Results , 1989 .