Preprints
Filtering by Subject: Earth Sciences
Two decades of kilometer-scale daily PM2.5 from satellite observations and machine learning reveal geographically diverging exposure in Ghana
Published: 2026-06-05
Subjects: Artificial Intelligence and Robotics, Atmospheric Sciences, Civil and Environmental Engineering, Earth Sciences, Engineering, Environmental Engineering, Environmental Monitoring, Environmental Public Health, Environmental Sciences, Geographic Information Sciences, Geography, Oceanography and Atmospheric Sciences and Meteorology, Other Earth Sciences, Remote Sensing, Spatial Science
Exposure to fine particulate matter (PM2.5) is a major contributor to global burden of disease, yet air quality data remain sparse in many low- and middle-income countries, limiting nationwide monitoring and effective policy development. We address this gap by developing a high-resolution gridded (1 km × 1 km) dataset for daily surface PM2.5 concentrations in Ghana from 2005 to 2025 by training [...]
Deciphering the morphology of turbiditic lobe bodies according to hierarchy and system size
Published: 2026-06-04
Subjects: Applied Statistics, Earth Sciences, Planetary Sciences, Planetary Sedimentology, Statistics and Probability
Turbiditic lobe bodies (LBs) are the ultimate deposits of source-to-sink systems. Their geometry and architecture vary with depositional environment (marine vs. lacustrine), hierarchy (lobe elements, lobes, lobe complexes), system size (large vs. small) and topographic confinement. Constraining these variations is useful for characterizing the dispersion of sediments, carbon, nutrients, and [...]
Satellite Embedding: A Review
Published: 2026-06-04
Subjects: Earth Sciences, Physical Sciences and Mathematics
Satellite embeddings have become a practical interface between large-scale Earth observation data and downstream geospatial analysis, yet the liter ature is still organized mainly around foundation models rather than the embeddings they produce. This review reframes the area from an embedding centered perspective. We first define satellite embeddings as reusable latent representations derived [...]
Comparing Process-Based and Machine Learning Models for Streamflow Prediction in the Kaligandaki River Basin, Nepal
Published: 2026-06-03
Subjects: Civil and Environmental Engineering, Earth Sciences, Engineering, Environmental Sciences, Hydrology, Physical Sciences and Mathematics, Water Resource Management
Reliable daily streamflow prediction is critical for hydropower operations, flood risk management, and irrigation planning in monsoon-dominated Himalayan river basins. While both process-based and machine learning (ML) approaches have been used for such tasks, systematic comparisons that decompose the sources of performance differences remain scarce. This study evaluates seven configurations: a [...]
Annual electricity access rate dataset for Africa from 2000-2021
Published: 2026-06-03
Subjects: Earth Sciences, Environmental Sciences
Accurate and spatially explicit electricity access data are essential for electrification planning and policy evaluation in Africa, yet existing data are often survey-based, infrequent, and temporally inconsistent. This study presents a harmonized Electricity Access Rate (EAR) dataset for Africa spanning 2000-2021, derived from satellite-based nighttime luminosity observations and gridded [...]
EARLY PLIOCENE DRAWDOWN AND EXPANSION OF THE ANTARCTIC PENINSULA ICE SHEET IN MARGUERITE BAY
Published: 2026-06-01
Subjects: Earth Sciences, Geochemistry, Glaciology, Sedimentology, Stratigraphy
The Antarctic Peninsula Ice Sheet (APIS) is situated in a rapidly and persistently warming region of Antarctica and its behavior under warmer conditions projected for Earth’s future remains poorly constrained. Interpretations of stratigraphic records of ice-sheet change from periods of warmth in Earth’s past are essential in providing boundary conditions for estimates of future ice loss and its [...]
Was there an ocean between the North China-Qaidam and Tarim blocks connecting the Mongol-Okhotsk and Paleo-Tethys oceans?
Published: 2026-06-01
Subjects: Earth Sciences, Geology, Tectonics and Structure
The tectonic history of the final amalgamation of Eurasia is puzzling: geological and paleomagnetic data yield contrasting interpretations. Paleomagnetism shows that the North China Block and the Qaidam Basin fragment, migrated northward by several thousand kilometers relative to Eurasia until the latest Jurassic-Early Cretaceous. If true, plate tectonic principles require that a North [...]
Extreme changes in water level regenerate reed stands and a stable water regime leads to die-off: lessons from the analysis of 40-year satellite time series observations in a shallow lake ecosystem.
Published: 2026-05-30
Subjects: Earth Sciences, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Hydrology, Natural Resources and Conservation, Physical Sciences and Mathematics, Terrestrial and Aquatic Ecology, Water Resource Management
Reed wetlands are key to the productivity of shallow lakes, and their condition is tightly governed by water level variability. Using long-term satellite observations, we provide the first analysis linking hydrology and reed vitality at Lake Neusiedl, a major climate sensitive wetland system in the Pannonian Basin. We assembled a 40-year record (1985–2025) of Landsat derived Enhanced Vegetation [...]
A benchmark deep learning dataset for the classification of supraglacial lake drainage mechanism across the central-west Greenland Ice Sheet
Published: 2026-05-29
Subjects: Artificial Intelligence and Robotics, Earth Sciences, Glaciology, Numerical Analysis and Scientific Computing, Physical Sciences and Mathematics
Supraglacial lakes on the Greenland Ice Sheet drain through physically distinct pathways: hydrofracture, moulins, lateral stream routing, and crevasse-fields. Each drainage mechanism carries unique implications for ice sheet dynamics. Existing automated classifications reduce each lake's drainage behavior to a time-series of scalar values representing the observed water surface-area and classify [...]
Resolving the SAI Trilemma with a Novel Core–Shell Mineral Aerosol: DoloSil-20, a Silica-Passivated Dolomite Architecture for Simultaneous Optical Efficiency, Thermal Neutrality, and Ozone Safety
Published: 2026-05-29
Subjects: Earth Sciences, Engineering, Environmental Sciences, Materials Science and Engineering, Oceanography and Atmospheric Sciences and Meteorology, Physical Sciences and Mathematics
Conventional stratospheric aerosol injection (SAI) strategies based on liquid sulfate aerosols (H2SO4.H2O) introduce well-documented risks of catalytic ozone destruction and stratospheric near-infrared heating. From a materials-science perspective, the core challenge is one of multi-objective material selection: identifying a particle composition that simultaneously optimizes optical performance, [...]
Lunar Formation by Triple Phase Transition in the Differentiating Proto-Earth
Published: 2026-05-28
Subjects: Astrophysics and Astronomy, Earth Sciences, Physics, Planetary Sciences, The Sun and the Solar System
The origin of the Moon remains one of the open questions of planetary science. The canonical giant impact model (Theia collision) predicts neither the near-isotopic identity of Earth and Moon, nor the crustal dichotomy, nor the ≈ 300 Myr delay of the terrestrial dynamo. The synestia model faces the same limitations. This work is conceptually distinct from both: it requires no external impactor, [...]
The Largest Mountain Belt of the Last Billion Years: The East African Orogen, its tectono-topographic evolution and global significance.
Published: 2026-05-28
Subjects: Earth Sciences
Hutton’s Principle of Uniformitarianism suggests that the present is the key to the past, and in the present, Earth’s topography is dominated by the Himalaya. The geological record clearly preserves past mountain ranges, but few have purported to have the effect on Earth’s surface systems (such as the atmosphere, hydrosphere, biosphere and ocean chemistry) that the Himalaya does today. The [...]
Downstream patterns in bedrock valley morphology encode climatic and tectonic forcing
Published: 2026-05-27
Subjects: Earth Sciences, Geomorphology
Fluvially-carved bedrock valleys are ubiquitous landscape features. Vertical incision into underlying bedrock generates valley relief, whereas lateral migration of the river channel widens the valley floor as the river erodes the valley walls. The relative efficacy of these processes, which can be modulated by precipitation and water discharge, sediment supply, lithology, and uplift rates is [...]
Post-glacial sedimentary evolution and stratigraphy of the shallow offshore areas of the Shetland Islands (UK)
Published: 2026-05-25
Subjects: Earth Sciences, Geology, Geophysics and Seismology, Sedimentology, Stratigraphy
We present a high-resolution seismic–sedimentological reconstruction of post-glacial sedimentation in three shallow offshore basins around the Shetland Islands (Dury Voe, Colgrave Sound/Basta Voe, and Yell Sound), based on integrated multibeam bathymetry, sub-bottom profiler data, and 77 vibrocores supported by radiocarbon dating. Sediment distribution is strongly controlled by inherited bedrock [...]
Hydroelectric Regulation Decouples Arctic Silica Delivery from the Diatom Bloom: A Climate-Independent Causal Attribution Across Twenty Subarctic Rivers
Published: 2026-05-23
Subjects: Earth Sciences, Hydrology, Oceanography, Physical Sciences and Mathematics
Large subarctic rivers deliver most of their dissolved nutrients during the spring freshet, in approximate phase with the ice-edge diatom bloom that those nutrients support. Hydroelectric regulation flattens the river hydrograph, holding back the freshet and raising winter discharge, and in doing so it redistributes nutrient delivery in time. Across twenty subarctic rivers spanning the Arctic [...]