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In common usage, climate change describes global warming—the ongoing increase in global average temperature—and its effects on Earth's climate system. Climate change in a broader sense also includes previous long-term changes to Earth's climate. The current rise in global average temperature is more rapid than previous changes, and is primarily caused by humans burning fossil fuels. Fossil fuel use, deforestation, and some agricultural and industrial practices increase greenhouse gases, notably carbon dioxide and methane.
Vegetation is an assemblage of plant species and the ground cover they provide. It is a general term, without specific reference to particular taxa, life forms, structure, spatial extent, or any other specific botanical or geographic characteristics. It is broader than the term flora which refers to species composition. Perhaps the closest synonym is plant community, but vegetation can, and often does, refer to a wider range of spatial scales than that term does, including scales as large as the global.
Snow comprises individual ice crystals that grow while suspended in the atmosphere—usually within clouds—and then fall, accumulating on the ground where they undergo further changes. It consists of frozen crystalline water throughout its life cycle, starting when, under suitable conditions, the ice crystals form in the atmosphere, increase to millimeter size, precipitate and accumulate on surfaces, then metamorphose in place, and ultimately melt, slide or sublimate away.
Crossing properties of soil saturation, defined as the duration and excursion of soil saturation below and above certain thresholds, are key variables to ecosystem functioning and evolution by primari
EPFL2022
In this study, a hydrodynamical model is coupled to a biogeochemical model, and then used to simulate the main physical, chemical and biological characteristics of Lake Geneva. The study period, going
Drought alters allocation patterns of carbon (C) and nutrients in trees and eventually impairs tree functioning. Elevated soil nutrient availability might alter the response of trees to drought. We hy