Workshop Overview:
The focus of our study is to develop the measurement concepts, observational architecture, and experiments that will increase our capacity to understand and predict the response of forest ecosystems to droughts and future climate extremes. We envisioned two workshops dedicated to the study. The first workshop, held in October 2019, addressed the state-of-the-art theory, models and measurement techniques for studying the water flow in soil-plant-atmosphere continuum and explored the mechanisms underlying the stress and response of plants to droughts. The participants discussed how these mechanisms are spatially and temporally scaled and to what extent the existing remote sensing observations can capture the forest water dynamics from space. Key science questions linking the water dynamics of forest ecosystems to carbon and energy cycles from plants to regional scales were discussed and several gaps in observations and modeling were identified.
In the second workshop, to be held in October 2020, we will pursue a number of avenues that would support needed technology development and science advancements to address the science questions identified in the first workshop. First, we will focus on developing the traceability between the science questions and observables in order to identify the needed measurements, and any necessary breakthroughs in observing architecture and performance. In particular, the study will explore how planned and potential exploratory microwave observations from space and their synergism with optical, hyperspectral, and/or thermal sensing can be used in sensing forest water dynamics from space. Second, we anticipate devising a strategy to support the goals of the study by a series of collaborative activities, including airborne and/or field campaigns, that include existing advanced technologies. These activities will address specific components of science and technology that are needed to improve our readiness and capability for a dedicated spaceborne mission going forward. Finally, we will outline the findings of the workshop to prepare a report and potentially a peer-reviewed publication.
Team Leads
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California Institute of Technology
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USDA-Forest Service
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Stanford University
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Jet Propulsion Laboratory
The study program schedule is available in .pdf here
- Elizabeth (Liz) Agee — Oak Ridge National Laboratory
- William (Bill) Anderegg — University of Utah
- Mallory Barnes — Indiana University
- Oliver Binks — The Australian National University
- Kerry Cawse-Nicholson — JPL
- Bradley Christoffersen — UT Rio Grande Valley
- Dara Entekhabi — MIT
- Christian Frankenberg — Caltech
- Pierre Gentine — Columbia University
- Nataniel (Natan) Holtzman — Stanford University
- Vincent Humphrey — Caltech
- Gaby Katul — Duke University
- Michael Keller — USDA Forest Service
- Alex Konings — Stanford University
- Yanlan Liu — Stanford University
- Marcos Longo — JPL
- Jordi Martinez-Vilalta — CREAF Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona
- Ashley Matheny — University of Texas at Austin
- Nate McDowell — PNNL
- Patrick Meir — Australian National University
- Maurizio Mencuccini — ICREA, Universidad Autònoma de Barcelona
- Assaad Mrad — Duke University
- Kim Novick — Indiana University – Bloomington
- Rafael Oliveira — University of Campinas
- Sassan Saatchi — JPL
- Lawren Sack — UCLA
- Paul Siqueira — University of Massachusetts, Amherst
- Susan Steele-Dunne — Delft University of Technology
- David R. Thompson — JPL
- Anna Trugman — UC Santa Barbara
- Yujie Wang — Caltech
- Richard Wehr — University of Arizona
- Jeffrey (Jeff) D. Wood — University of Missouri
- Xiangtao Xu — Cornell University
- Pieter Zuidema — Wageningen University
