Relation between convective rainfall properties and antecedent soil moisture heterogeneity conditions in North Africa

Recent observational studies have demonstrated the relevance of soil moisture heterogeneity and the associated thermally-induced circulation on deep convection and rainfall triggering. However, whether this dynamical mechanism further influences rainfall propertiessuch as rain volume or timinghas yet to be confirmed by observational data. Here, we analyze 10 years of satellite-based sub-daily soil moisture and precipitation records and explore the potential of strong spatial gradients in morning soil moisture to influence the properties of afternoon rainfall in the North African region, at the 100-km scale. We find that the convective rain systems that form over locally drier soils and anomalously strong soil moisture gradients have a tendency to initiate earlier in the afternoon; they also yield lower volumes of rain, weaker intensity and lower spatial variability. The strongest sensitivity to antecedent soil conditions is identified for the timing of the rain onset; it is found to be correlated with the magnitude of the soil moisture gradient. Further analysis shows that the early initiation of rainfall over dry soils and strong surface gradients yet requires the presence of a very moist boundary layer on that day. Our findings agree well with the expected effects of thermally-induced circulation on rainfall properties suggested by theoretical studies and point to the potential of locally drier and heterogeneous soils to influence convective rainfall development. The systematic nature of the identified effect of soil moisture state on the onset time of rainstorms in the region is of particular relevance and may help foster research on rainfall predictability

Atmospheric boundary layer dynamics from balloon soundings worldwide: CLASS4GL v1.0

The coupling between soil, vegetation and atmosphere is thought to be crucial in the development and intensification of weather extremes, especially meteorological droughts, heat waves and severe storms. Therefore, understanding the evolution of the atmospheric boundary layer (ABL) and the role of land–atmosphere feedbacks is necessary for earlier warnings, better climate projection and timely societal adaptation. However, this understanding is hampered by the difficulties of attributing cause–effect relationships from complex coupled models and the irregular space–time distribution of in situ observations of the land–atmosphere system. As such, there is a need for simple deterministic appraisals that systematically discriminate land–atmosphere interactions from observed weather phenomena over large domains and climatological time spans. Here, we present a new interactive data platform to study the behavior of the ABL and land–atmosphere interactions based on worldwide weather balloon soundings and an ABL model. This software tool – referred to as CLASS4GL (http://class4gl.eu, last access: 27 May 2018) – is developed with the objectives of (a) mining appropriate global observational data from ∼15 million weather balloon soundings since 1981 and combining them with satellite and reanalysis data and (b) constraining and initializing a numerical model of the daytime evolution of the ABL that serves as a tool to interpret these observations mechanistically and deterministically. As a result, it fully automizes extensive global model experiments to assess the effects of land and atmospheric conditions on the ABL evolution as observed in different climate regions around the world. The suitability of the set of observations, model formulations and global parameters employed by CLASS4GL is extensively validated. In most cases, the framework is able to realistically reproduce the observed daytime response of the mixed-layer height, potential temperature and specific humidity from the balloon soundings. In this extensive global validation exercise, a bias of 10.1&thinsp;m&thinsp;h−1, −0.036&thinsp;K&thinsp;h−1 and 0.06&thinsp;g&thinsp;kg−1&thinsp;h−1 is found for the morning-to-afternoon evolution of the mixed-layer height, potential temperature and specific humidity. The virtual tool is in continuous development and aims to foster a better process understanding of the drivers of the ABL evolution and their global distribution, particularly during the onset and amplification of weather extremes. Finally, it can also be used to scrutinize the representation of land–atmosphere feedbacks and ABL dynamics in Earth system models, numerical weather prediction models, atmospheric reanalysis and satellite retrievals, with the ultimate goal of improving local climate projections, providing earlier warning of extreme weather and fostering a more effective development of climate adaptation strategies. The tool can be easily downloaded via http://class4gl.eu (last access: 27 May 2018) and is open source.</p

The Genomic Signature of Crop-Wild Introgression in Maize

The evolutionary significance of hybridization and subsequent introgression has long been appreciated, but evaluation of the genome-wide effects of these phenomena has only recently become possible. Crop-wild study systems represent ideal opportunities to examine evolution through hybridization. For example, maize and the conspecific wild teosinte Zea mays ssp. mexicana, (hereafter, mexicana) are known to hybridize in the fields of highland Mexico. Despite widespread evidence of gene flow, maize and mexicana maintain distinct morphologies and have done so in sympatry for thousands of years. Neither the genomic extent nor the evolutionary importance of introgression between these taxa is understood. In this study we assessed patterns of genome-wide introgression based on 39,029 single nucleotide polymorphisms genotyped in 189 individuals from nine sympatric maize-mexicana populations and reference allopatric populations. While portions of the maize and mexicana genomes were particularly resistant to introgression (notably near known cross-incompatibility and domestication loci), we detected widespread evidence for introgression in both directions of gene flow. Through further characterization of these regions and preliminary growth chamber experiments, we found evidence suggestive of the incorporation of adaptive mexicana alleles into maize during its expansion to the highlands of central Mexico. In contrast, very little evidence was found for adaptive introgression from maize to mexicana. The methods we have applied here can be replicated widely, and such analyses have the potential to greatly informing our understanding of evolution through introgressive hybridization. Crop species, due to their exceptional genomic resources and frequent histories of spread into sympatry with relatives, should be particularly influential in these studies

Optimal Risk Transfers in Insurance Groups

Optimal risk transfers are derived within an insurance group consisting of two separate legal entities, operating under potentially different regulatory capital requirements and capital costs. Consistent with regulatory practice, capital requirements for each entity are computed by either a value-at-risk or an expected shortfall risk measure. The optimality criterion consists of minimising the risk-adjusted value of the total group liabilities, with valuation carried out using a cost-of-capital approach. The optimisation problems are analytically solved and it is seen that optimal risk transfers often involve the transfer of tail risk (unlimited reinsurance layers) to the more weakly regulated entity. We show that, in the absence of a capital requirement for the credit risk that specifically arises from the risk transfer, optimal risk transfers achieve capital efficiency at the cost of increasing policyholder deficit. However, when credit risk is properly reflected in the capital requirement, incentives for tail-risk transfers vanish and policyholder welfare is restored

Estimating maize genetic erosion in modernized smallholder agriculture

Replacement of crop landraces by modern varieties is thought to cause diversity loss. We studied genetic erosion in maize within a model system; modernized smallholder agriculture in southern Mexico. The local seed supply was described through interviews and in situ seed collection. In spite of the dominance of commercial seed, the informal seed system was found to persist. True landraces were rare and most informal seed was derived from modern varieties (creolized). Seed lots were characterized for agronomical traits and molecular markers. We avoided the problem of non-consistent nomenclature by taking individual seed lots as the basis for diversity inference. We defined diversity as the weighted average distance between seed lots. Diversity was calculated for subsets of the seed supply to assess the impact of replacing traditional landraces with any of these subsets. Results were different for molecular markers, ear- and vegetative/flowering traits. Nonetheless, creolized varieties showed low diversity for all traits. These varieties were distinct from traditional landraces and little differentiated from their ancestral stocks. Although adoption of creolized maize into the informal seed system has lowered diversity as compared to traditional landraces, genetic erosion was moderated by the distinct features offered by modern varieties

A Geospatial Modelling Approach Integrating Archaeobotany and Genetics to Trace the Origin and Dispersal of Domesticated Plants

Background: The study of the prehistoric origins and dispersal routes of domesticated plants is often based on the analysis of either archaeobotanical or genetic data. As more data become available, spatially explicit models of crop dispersal can be used to combine different types of evidence. Methodology/Principal Findings: We present a model in which a crop disperses through a landscape that is represented by a conductance matrix. From this matrix, we derive least-cost distances from the geographical origin of the crop and use these to predict the age of archaeological crop remains and the heterozygosity of crop populations. We use measures of the overlap and divergence of dispersal trajectories to predict genetic similarity between crop populations. The conductance matrix is constructed from environmental variables using a number of parameters. Model parameters are determined with multiple-criteria optimization, simultaneously fitting the archaeobotanical and genetic data. The consilience reached by the model is the extent to which it converges around solutions optimal for both archaeobotanical and genetic data. We apply the modelling approach to the dispersal of maize in the Americas. Conclusions/Significance: The approach makes possible the integrative inference of crop dispersal processes, whil

Contrasting effects of long term versus short-term nitrogen addition on photosynthesis and respiration in the Arctic

We examined the effects of short (<1–4 years) and long-term (22 years) nitrogen (N) and/or phosphorus (P) addition on the foliar CO2 exchange parameters of the Arctic species Betula nana and Eriophorum vaginatum in northern Alaska. Measured variables included: the carboxylation efficiency of Rubisco (Vcmax), electron transport capacity (Jmax), dark respiration (Rd), chlorophyll a and b content (Chl), and total foliar N (N). For both B. nana and E. vaginatum, foliar N increased by 20–50 % as a consequence of 1–22 years of fertilisation, respectively, and for B. nana foliar N increase was consistent throughout the whole canopy. However, despite this large increase in foliar N, no significant changes in Vcmax and Jmax were observed. In contrast, Rd was significantly higher (>25 %) in both species after 22 years of N addition, but not in the shorter-term treatments. Surprisingly, Chl only increased in both species the first year of fertilisation (i.e. the first season of nutrients applied), but not in the longer-term treatments. These results imply that: (1) under current (low) N availability, these Arctic species either already optimize their photosynthetic capacity per leaf area, or are limited by other nutrients; (2) observed increases in Arctic NEE and GPP with increased nutrient availability are caused by structural changes like increased leaf area index, rather than increased foliar photosynthetic capacity and (3) short-term effects (1–4 years) of nutrient addition cannot always be extrapolated to a larger time scale, which emphasizes the importance of long-term ecological experiments

Determination of genetic structure of germplasm collections: are traditional hierarchical clustering methods appropriate for molecular marker data?

Despite the availability of newer approaches, traditional hierarchical clustering remains very popular in genetic diversity studies in plants. However, little is known about its suitability for molecular marker data. We studied the performance of traditional hierarchical clustering techniques using real and simulated molecular marker data. Our study also compared the performance of traditional hierarchical clustering with model-based clustering (STRUCTURE). We showed that the cophenetic correlation coefficient is directly related to subgroup differentiation and can thus be used as an indicator of the presence of genetically distinct subgroups in germplasm collections. Whereas UPGMA performed well in preserving distances between accessions, Ward excelled in recovering groups. Our results also showed a close similarity between clusters obtained by Ward and by STRUCTURE. Traditional cluster analysis can provide an easy and effective way of determining structure in germplasm collections using molecular marker data, and, the output can be used for sampling core collections or for association studies