Preprints
Filtering by Subject: Agriculture
Climate Change Impacts on Inland and Black Sea Marine Fisheries: Risks, Adaptation, and Sustainable Investment Pathways
Published: 2025-05-16
Subjects: Agriculture, Animal Sciences, Other Life Sciences
This paper explores climate adaptation and sustainable investment strategies within the fisheries and aquaculture sectors, with a focus on vulnerable regions such as the Black Sea basin. As climate change intensifies environmental pressures and socioeconomic vulnerabilities, building resilience requires an integrated approach combining localized adaptation, mitigation and strategic investment. [...]
Innovation in environmental sustainability: carbon credits with proof of reserve on rural properties according to the standards of regulated markets
Published: 2025-05-07
Subjects: Agriculture
Farms are increasingly recognized as carbon sinks with significant potential to mitigate climate change. This study documents how farms can become positive climate assets by using portable sensors, satellite imagery, blockchain, and AI to quantify and monetize carbon removal. This technological integration enables the issuance of traceable and secure carbon credits, promoting sustainable land use [...]
Nitrogen Mineralization of Cover Crop Residue Depends on Carbon to Nitrogen Ratio and Soil Temperature
Published: 2025-05-06
Subjects: Agriculture
Groundwater nitrate contamination is largely attributed to fertilizer and intensive livestock manure inputs in agricultural systems. California’s Salinas Valley is an area where state policy is aiming to reduce nitrate leaching. Non-legume winter cover crops can help decrease nitrate leaching by scavenging residual soil nitrogen (N) during winter fallow periods following the cropping season. [...]
Assessing the effectiveness of irrigator-driven groundwater conservation programs to drought: a case study of the northwestern Kansas Local Enhanced Management Areas
Published: 2025-04-08
Subjects: Agriculture, Hydrology, Natural Resources and Conservation, Natural Resources Management and Policy, Sustainability, Water Resource Management
Groundwater pumping for irrigation has led to significant decreases in groundwater levels in agricultural areas around the world, including the U.S. High Plains Aquifer. Here, we used a process-based corn and sorghum crop model, AquaCrop, to assess the effectiveness of different irrigation management strategies during a synthetic multi-year drought. We focused on the Groundwater Management [...]
Comprehensive Assessment of Flood Risk and Community Impact of Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations in Iowa
Published: 2025-02-05
Subjects: Agriculture, Civil and Environmental Engineering, Civil Engineering, Engineering, Environmental Engineering, Hydraulic Engineering, Life Sciences
Flooding presents a significant risk to Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations (CAFOs), especially in regions increasingly affected by extreme weather events. This study uses advanced geospatial analysis techniques to assess the environmental and economic vulnerabilities of 12,703 CAFOs across Iowa, United States. We focused on the exposure of CAFOS to 100-year and 500-year floodplains, [...]
The role of information in shaping the emerging agricultural soil carbon market
Published: 2025-01-23
Subjects: Agriculture, Life Sciences
The agricultural soil carbon market that has emerged in recent years is widely regarded as a promising opportunity for farmers in the Global North and South, enabling them to generate carbon credits and derive a source of income from the adoption of alternative land management practices which contribute to climate change mitigation by increasing soil carbon sequestration and/or reducing [...]
Global industrial disruption following nuclear war
Published: 2024-12-05
Subjects: Agriculture, International and Area Studies, Other Geography, Risk Analysis
Nuclear war poses catastrophic risks not only through its immediate effects and potential nuclear winter, but also through the disruption of industrial production on which modern civilization depends. In this study we estimate the reduction in global industrial output following a US-Russia nuclear war, as well as a more limited India-Pakistan exchange, by combining geospatial analysis with [...]
The State of Global Catastrophic Risk Research: A Bibliometric Review
Published: 2024-11-30
Subjects: Agriculture, Biodiversity, Environmental Sciences, Environmental Studies, Food Science, Geography, Other Life Sciences
The global catastrophic risk (GCR) and existential risk (ER) literature focuses on analysing and preventing potential major global catastrophes including a human extinction event. Over the past two decades, the field of GCR/ER research has grown considerably. However, there has been little meta-research on the field itself. How large has this body of literature become? What topics does it cover? [...]
Exposure to compound climate hazards transmitted via global agricultural trade networks
Published: 2024-11-16
Subjects: Agriculture, Climate, Environmental Studies, Risk Analysis
Compound climate hazards, such as co-occurring temperature and precipitation extremes, substantially impact people and ecosystems. Internal climate variability combines with the forced global warming response to determine both the magnitude and spatial distribution of these events, and their consequences can propagate from one country to another via many pathways. We examine how exposure to [...]
Sensing the dynamic nature of fragmented croplands in India through earth observation: a comprehensive review
Published: 2024-11-10
Subjects: Agriculture, Earth Sciences, Environmental Sciences, Food Science, Geography, Nature and Society Relations, Physical and Environmental Geography, Remote Sensing, Spatial Science
Fragmentation or the breakdown of landholdings to smaller parcels has an adverse impact on crop yields and productivity because of its uneconomic operational sizes. This comprehensive review reflects the insights into the complex dynamics of small landholding (SLs) in India by leveraging earth observation (EO) based sensing technology through synthesizing existing literature, methodologies and [...]
Unveiling Year-Round Cropland Cover by Soil-Specific Spectral Unmixing of Landsat and Sentinel-2 Time Series
Published: 2024-09-28
Subjects: Agriculture, Earth Sciences, Environmental Indicators and Impact Assessment, Environmental Monitoring
Croplands are essential for food security but also impact the environment, biodiversity, and climate. Understanding, monitoring, modeling, and managing these impacts require accurate, comprehensive information on cropland vegetation cover.This study aimed to continuously monitor the state and vegetative processes of cropland, focusing on the assessment of bare soil and its cover with [...]
A Community-Centric Intelligent Cyberinfrastructure for Addressing Nitrogen Pollution using Web Systems and Conversational AI
Published: 2024-09-13
Subjects: Agricultural Science, Agriculture, Environmental Studies, Marine Biology, Pharmacology, Toxicology and Environmental Health
The Blue-Green Action Platform (BlueGAP) information system (IS) is an intelligent cyberinfrastructure framework designed to support large-scale water quality assessments in the context of demographic statistics and community stories about water issues. The system prioritizes collaboration with interested parties in three pilot watersheds with test cases implemented in US locations including [...]
Resilient foods for preventing global famine: a review of food supply interventions for global catastrophic food shocks including nuclear winter and infrastructure collapse
Published: 2024-09-12
Subjects: Agricultural Science, Agriculture, Animal Sciences, Aquaculture and Fisheries Life Sciences, Chemical Engineering, Engineering, Food Science, Life Sciences, Plant Sciences, Risk Analysis
Global catastrophic threats to the food system upon which human society depends are numerous. A nuclear war or volcanic eruption could collapse agricultural yields by inhibiting crop growth. Nuclear electromagnetic pulses or extreme pandemics could disrupt industry and mass-scale food supply by unprecedented levels. Global food storage is limited. What can be done? This article presents the state [...]
HarvestStat Africa – Harmonized Subnational Crop Statistics for Sub-Saharan Africa
Published: 2024-09-10
Subjects: Agriculture, Environmental Sciences
Sub-Saharan Africa faces severe agricultural data scarcity amidst high food insecurity and a large agricultural yield gap, making crop production data crucial for understanding and enhancing food systems. To address this gap, HarvestStat Africa presents the largest compilation of open-access subnational crop statistics and time-series across Sub-Saharan Africa. Based on agricultural statistics [...]
Seaweed Cultivation: A Cost-Effective Strategy for Food Production in a Global Catastrophe
Published: 2024-08-02
Subjects: Agriculture, Analysis, Life Sciences, Spatial Science
An event such as a large volcanic eruption, nuclear winter or asteroid/comet impact has the potential to seriously reduce incoming sunlight, impacting both the global climate and conventional crop yields. This could have catastrophic impacts on human nutrition, unless the food system can adapt. One possible answer is seaweed, where growth is projected to be less impacted (or even enhanced) by the [...]