Modelling soil water and climate dynamics to understand soil formation in Mediterranean landscapes

Influence of the Mediterranean climate, relief and geology can shed light on the most important processes that affect the mechanisms and rate of bedrock weathering. Despite the effort dedicated to exploring the processes of soil formation, little is known about the quantitative aspects of these processes. This research is based on developing a spatially explicit model of soil water and climate dynamics to explain the processes in soil formation. This model includes a simple soil water balance model, climatic data, topographic variables and runs a daily time step. The model calibration is performed with satellite soil moisture data for the Mediterranean basin. The model highlights the importance of soil water flux at different topographic positions on soil formation on long-term time scales.