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HS1.3.2 | Bridging timescales to understand the evolution of the critical zone
EDI
Bridging timescales to understand the evolution of the critical zone
Convener: David LitwinECSECS | Co-conveners: Caroline FenskeECSECS, Hongkai Gao, Clement Roques
Hydrological models often treat landscapes as static backgrounds on which hydrological processes play out. This is perhaps natural in the sense that hydrologic response is often described with respect to short-term forcing like rainfall, snowmelt, and diurnal changes in evaporation. However, landscape morphology, as well as soil and ecosystems, are constantly changing, albeit sometimes not on human timescales. These processes may be related to, among other things, vegetation (seasonal to centennial timescales), human activities (seasonal to millennial), weathering and soil formation (centennial to millennial), or landscape evolution (millennial to millions of years). Because all of these processes together shape the critical zone and affect how it functions, bridging gaps between short term processes and longer-term environmental change is essential for understanding landscapes and maintaining their ability to sustain life. This also includes a better understanding of tipping points and memory effects within these systems.

We invite contributions that use field measurements, modeling, or theory to explore how (comparatively) rapid hydrological and human-directed processes are the result of or produce longer term landscape change as well as possible feedback cycles between these processes. We hope to use this space to discuss how we can better achieve coupling and understanding across timescales and a broad range of fields, through new computational methods, modeling theories, and innovative field study design.

Examples:
- How landscape-scale changes due to climate change or human activity affect water flow paths and soil erosion and vice versa
- The role of hydrologic variability in selecting for certain vegetation communities
- Links between groundwater flow and the development of soil and weathering profiles and vice versa
- The cumulative effects of hydrological events on critical zone structure and landscape evolution