Soil chemical washing has the disadvantages of long reaction time, slow reaction rate and unstable effect. Thus, there is an urgent need to find a cost-effective and widely applicable alternative power to facilitate the migration of washing solutions in the soil, so as to achieve efficient removal of heavy metals, reduce the risk of soil compaction, and mitigate the damage of soil structure. Therefore, the study used a combination of freeze-thaw cycle (FTC) and chemical washing to obtain three-dimensional images of soil pore structure using micro-X-ray microtomography, and applied image analysis techniques to study the effects of freeze-thaw washing on the characteristics of different pore structures of the soil, and then revealed the effects of pore structure on the removal of heavy metals. The results showed that the soil pore structure of the freeze-thaw washing treatment (FT) became more porous and complex, which increased the soil imaged porosity (TIP), pore number (TNP), porosity of macropores and irregular pores, permeability, and heavy metal removal rate. Macroporosity, fractal dimension, and TNP were the main factors contributing to the increase in TIP between treatments. The porous structure resulted in larger effective pore diameters, which contain a greater number of branching pathways and pore networks, allowing the chemical washing solutions to fully contact the soil, increasing the roughness of the soil particle surface, mitigating the risk of soil compaction, and decreasing the contamination of heavy metals. The results of this study contribute to provide new insights into the management of heavy metal pollution in agricultural soils.

The vadose zone acts as a natural buffer that prevents contaminants such as arsenic (As) from contaminating groundwater resources. Despite its capability to retain As, our previous studies revealed that a substantial amount of As could be remobilized from soil under repeated wet-dry conditions. Overlooking this might underestimate the potential risk of groundwater contamination. This study quantified the remobilization of As in the vadose zone and developed a prediction model based on soil properties. 22 unsaturated soil columns were used to simulate vadose zones with varying soil properties. Repeated wet-dry cycles were conducted upon the As-retaining soil columns. Consequently, 13.9-150.6 mg/kg of As was remobilized from the columns, which corresponds to 37.0-74.6 % of initially retained As. From the experimental results, a machine learning model using a random forest algorithm was established to predict the potential for As remobilization based on readily accessible soil properties, including organic matter (OM) content, iron (Fe) content, uniformity coefficient, D30, and bulk density. Shapley additive explanation analyses revealed the interrelated effects of multiple soil prop-erties. D30, which is inter-related with Fe content, exhibited the highest contribution to As remobilization, fol-lowed by OM content, which was partially mediated by bulk density.

Nitrogen is an essential element for life but its excessive release into the environment in the form of reactive nitrogen causes severe damage, including acidification and eutrophication. One of the main sources of nitrogen pollution is the use of fertilizers in agricultural soils. Feammox is a recently described pathway that couples ammonium (NH4+) oxidation with iron (Fe) reduction. In this study, the enrichment and bioaugmentation of anaerobic sludge under conditions that promote Feammox activity were investigated. The first enrichment stage (E1) achieved 28% of ammonium removal after 28 days of incubation, with a production of 30 mg/L of Fe2+. E1 was then used as inoculum for two enrichments at 35 degrees C with different carbon sources: sodium acetate (E2) and sodium bicarbonate (E3). Neither E2 nor E3 showed significant NH4+ removal, but E2 was highly effective in iron reduction, reaching Fe2+ concentrations of 110 mg/L. Additionally, an increase in nitrate (NO3-) concentration was observed, which may indicate the occurrence of this pathway in the Feammox process. The Monod kinetic model, analyzed using AQUASIM software, showed a good fit to the experimental data for NH4+, NO3-, and Fe2+. Sequencing analysis revealed the presence of phyla associated with Feammox activity. Although there was only a slight difference in NH4+ removal between the bioaugmented and non-augmented control sludge, the bioaugmented sludge was statistically superior in nitrate production and iron reduction. This study provides valuable insights into the enrichment and bioaugmentation of the Feammox process potential large-scale wastewater treatment applications.

Forest growth in tropical regions is regulated in part by climatic factors, such as precipitation and temperature, and by soil factors, such as nutrient availability and water storage capacity. We examined a decade of growth data from Eucalyptus clonal plantations from over 113,000 forest inventory plots across a 10 million-ha portion of Mato Grosso do Sul in southwestern Brazil. From this full dataset, three subsets were screened: 71,000 plots to characterize growth and yield across water table depth classes, 17,000 plots to build generalized models, and 50,000 plots for clone-based analyses. Average precipitation varied little across the region (1150 to 1270 mm yr(-1)), but water table depth ranged from less than 10 m to over 100 m. Where the water table was within 10 m of the surface, about 20 % of the total water used by trees came from this saturated zone. Water tables deeper than 50 m contributed very little to tree water use. Sites with a water table within 10 m averaged 47 m(3) ha(-1) yr(-1) in stem growth (mean annual increment, MAI) across a full rotation, compared to less than 37 m(3) ha(-1) yr(-1) for sites with water tables deeper than 50 m. Drought-induced canopy damage rose from 7 % to 30 % along the water tables depth gradient, while tree mortality rose nearly fourfold. The optimal stocking level was about 1360 trees ha(-1) where water tables were accessible, declining to 1080 trees ha(-1) where they were not. Among the 15 most planted Eucalyptus clones, increases in MAI from the lowest to highest water table depths ranged from + 4.8 to + 16.8 m(3) ha(-1) yr(-1) , reflecting significant genotype-environment interactions. On average, MAI decreased by 0.8 m(3) ha(-1) yr(-1) (ranging from 0.4 to 1.4) for every 10 m increase in water table depth. Similarly, the Site Index at base age 7 years declined from 31 m to 27 m, with an average reduction of 0.25 m per 10 m increase in water table depth. Physiographic modeling of water table depths offers useful information for forest management practices like forest inventory and planning, clonal allocation, optimized planting densities, fertilization strategies, coppice techniques, and other landscape-specific strategies like tree breeding zones.

The environmental threat, pollution and damage posed by heavy metals to air, water, and soil emphasize the critical need for effective remediation strategies. This review mainly focuses on microbial electrochemical technologies (MET) for treating heavy metal pollutants, specifically includes Chromium (Cr), Copper (Cu), Zinc (Zn), Cadmium (Cd), Lead (Pb), Nickel (Ni), and Cobalt (Co). First, it explores the mechanisms and current applications of MET in heavy metal treatments in detail. Second, it systematically summarizes the key microbial communities involved, analyzing their extracellular electron transfer (EET) processes and summarizing strategies to enhance the EET efficiencies. Next, the review also highlights the synergistic microbial interactions in bioelectrochemical systems (BES) during the recovery and removal (remediation) processes of heavy metals, underscoring the crucial role of microorganisms in the transfer of the electrons. Then, this paper discussed how factors including pH values, applied voltages, types and concentrations of electron donors, electrode materials, biofilm thickness and other factors affect the treatment efficiencies of some specific metals in BES. BES has shown its great superiority in treating heavy metals. For example, for the treatments of Cr6+, under low pH conditions, the recovery and removal rate of Cr-6(+) by double chambers microbial fuel cell (DCMFC) can generally reach 98-99%, with some cases even achieving 100% (Gangadharan & Nambi, 2015). For the treatments of heavy metal ions such as Cu2+, Zn2+ and Cd2+, BES can also achieve the rates of treatments of more than 90% under the corresponding conditions of appropriate pH values and applied voltages(Choi, Hu, & Lim, 2014; W. Teng, G. Liu, H. Luo, R. Zhang, & Y. Xiang, 2016; Y. N. Wu et al., 2019; Y. N. Wu et al., 2018). After that, the review outlines the future challenges and the research opportunities for understanding the mechanisms of BES and microbial EET in heavy metal treatments. Finally, the prospect of future BES researches are pointed out, including the combinations with existing wastewater treatment systems, the integrations with the wind energy and the solar energy, and the application of machine learning (ML) in future BES. This article has certain significance and value for readers to better understand the working principles of BES and better operate and control BES to deal with heavy metal pollutants.

Early water stress detection is important for water use yield and sustainability. Traditional methods using the Internet of Things (IoT), such as soil moisture sensors, usually do not provide timely alerts, causing inefficient water use and, in some cases, crop damage. This research presents an innovative early water stress detection method in lettuce plants using Thermal Infrared (TIR) and RGB images in a controlled lab setting. The proposed method integrates advanced image processing techniques, including background elimination via Hue-Saturation- Value (HSV) thresholds, wavelet denoising for thermal image enhancement, RGB-TIR fusion using Principal Component Analysis (PCA), and Gaussian Mixture Model (GMM) clustering to segment stress regions. The leaves stressed areas annotated in the RGB image through yellow pseudo-coloring. This approach is predicated on the fact that when stomata close, transpiration decreases, which causes an increase in the temperature of the affected area. Experimental results reveal that this new approach can detect water stress up to 84 h earlier than conventional soil humidity sensors. Also, a comparative analysis was conducted where key components of the proposed hybrid framework were omitted. The results show inconsistent and inaccurate stress detection when excluding wavelet denoising and PCA fusion. A comparative analysis of image processing performed on a single- board computer (SBC) and through cloud computing over 5 G showed that SBC was 8.27% faster than cloud computing over a 5 G connection. The proposed method offers a more timely and accurate identification of water stress and promises significant benefits in improving crop yield and reducing water usage in indoor farming.

Soil freeze-thaw state influences multiple terrestrial ecosystem processes, such as soil hydrology and carbon cycling. However, knowledge of historical long-term changes in the timing, duration, and temperature of freeze-thaw processes remains insufficient, and studies exploring the combined or individual contributions of climatic factors-such as air temperature, precipitation, snow depth, and wind speed-are rare, particularly in current thermokarst landscapes induced by abrupt permafrost thawing. Based on ERA5-Land reanalysis, MODIS observations, and integrated thermokarst landform maps, we found that: 1) Hourly soil temperature from the reanalysis effectively captured the temporal variations of in-situ observations, with Pearson' r of 0.66-0.91. 2) Despite an insignificant decrease in daily freeze-thaw cycles in 1981-2022, other indicators in the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau (QTP) changed significantly, including delayed freezing onset (0.113 d yr- 1), advanced thawing onset (-0.22 d yr- 1), reduced frozen days (-0.365 d yr- 1), increased frozen temperature (0.014 degrees C yr- 1), and decreased daily freeze-thaw temperature range (-0.015 degrees C yr- 1). 3) Total contributions indicated air temperature was the dominant climatic driver of these changes, while indicators characterizing daily freeze-thaw cycles were influenced mainly by the combined effects of increased precipitation and air temperature, with remarkable spatial heterogeneity. 4) When regionally averaged, completely thawed days increased faster in the thermokarstaffected areas than in their primarily distributed grasslands-alpine steppe (47.69%) and alpine meadow (22.64%)-likely because of their stronger warming effect of precipitation. Locally, paired comparison within 3 x 3 pixel windows from MODIS data revealed consistent results, which were pronounced when the thermokarst-affected area exceeded about 38% per 1 km2. Conclusively, the warming and wetting climate has significantly altered soil freeze-thaw processes on the QTP, with the frozen soil environment in thermokarstaffected areas, dominated by thermokarst lakes, undergoing more rapid degradation. These insights are crucial for predicting freeze-thaw dynamics and assessing their ecological impacts on alpine grasslands.

Natural marine clays exhibit distinct dynamic behavior compared to remolded counterparts due to their inherent structural properties. Dynamic and static triaxial tests were conducted on both marine clay types to evaluate stress-strain behavior, double amplitude strains, pore water pressure, and dynamic elastic modulus, as well as post-cyclic strength attenuation. The results indicate that due to the structural properties, the effective stress path of undisturbed samples is more ductile than that of remolded samples. Also, there is a clear inflection point in the strain development curve of undisturbed samples. The structure exerts a certain degree of restraint on the strain development of the undisturbed samples, and has a distinct impact on the variation of pore water pressure at varying dynamic stress levels. Both marine clay types exhibited gradual reductions in dynamic elastic modulus and marked undrained strength attenuation. Critically, the attenuation of dynamic elastic modulus in undisturbed samples aligned with post-cyclic strength loss, while remolded samples exhibited greater dynamic elastic modulus loss relative to strength degradation. These findings clarify the role of soil structure in cyclic response and strength degradation, offering insights for the long-term stability assessment of structures and disaster mitigation in marine clay engineering.

This study analyzes the effects of Hurricane Eta on the Chiriqui Viejo River basin, revealing the significant impact of extreme weather events on the hydrological dynamics of the region. The maximum rainfall recorded on November 4, 2020, reached 223.8 mm, while the flow in Paso Canoa reached 638.03 m3/s, demonstrating the magnitude of the event and the inability of the basin to handle such high volumes of water. Through a detailed analysis, it was observed that soil saturation resulted in direct runoff of up to 70.0 mm that same day, which shows that the infiltration capacity of the soil was quickly exceeded. Despite the damage observed, there are currently no advanced hydrological studies on extreme events in critical basins such as the Chiriqui Viejo River. This lack of research reflects a serious lack of planning and assessment of the risks associated with phenomena of this magnitude. One of the most critical problems found is the lack of specialized hydrology professionals, who are essential to carry out detailed studies and ensure sustainable management of water resources. In a context where climate change increases the frequency and intensity of extreme events, the absence of hydrologists in the region puts the resilience of the basin to future disasters at risk. The basin's hydraulic system demonstrated its inability to handle high flows, underscoring the need to improve flood control and water retention infrastructure. In addition, the lack of effective hydrological planning and coordination in the management of hydraulic infrastructures compromises both the safety of downstream communities and the sustainability of hydroelectric reservoirs, vital for the region.

This article investigates the influence of climatic and geographical characteristics in south-western region of Bangladesh on the temporal dynamics of post-cyclone impacts, with a critical focus on biophysical contexts. By quantitatively assessing the environmental consequences of cyclones Amphan (2020), Yaas (2021), Mocha (2023) and Remal (2024), the study offers a nuanced understanding of flood damage extent and vegetation health, measured through advanced remote sensing and geospatial techniques. Using Sentinel-1 (GRD) and Sentinel-2 (MSI) satellite imageries from 2020 to 2024, the study has examined post-cyclone changes of vegetation health and flood damage extent using available indices such as Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) and Soil-Adjusted Vegetation Index (SAVI). The results exhibit substantial spatial disparities occurred due to the cyclone events, with NDVI variations ranging from - 0.124 to 0.546 (Amphan), - 0.033 to 0.498 (Mocha), - 0.086 to 0.458 (Yaas), and - 0.061 to 0.362 (Remal), indicating significant ecological stress. Corresponding SAVI changes ranged from - 0.001 to 0.396 (Amphan), - 0.029 to 0.338 (Mocha), - 0.002 to 0.345 (Yaas), and - 0.0524 to 0.269 (Remal). Negative indices underscore potential vegetation degradation, while positive values indicate resilience or post-cyclone recovery. Furthermore, flood damage analysis indicates to a more severe and unevenly distributed impact than previously recognized, particularly in areas with pre-existing vulnerabilities with the damage extent variations between - 35.918 to - 2.0093 (Amphan), - 35.334 to - 4.4059 (Mocha), - 34.806 to - 0.94921 (Yaas), and - 48.469 to 0.00255 (Remal). The Geographically Weighted Regression (GWR), model demonstrates a robust relationship, with r2 values of 0.894, 0.889, 0.899, and 0.95, indicating that approximately 85% of the ecological changes are driven by fluctuations of vegetation due to flood. The insight from this research provides a foundation of flood damage assessment technique occurred by cyclones in a short span of time to aid immediate policy recommendations to enhance resilience in remote areas of the coastal regions of Bangladesh.