A new Circumpolar Active Layer Monitoring (CALM) site was established in 2009 at the Limnopolar Lake watershed in Byers Peninsula, Livingston Island, Antarctica, to provide a node in the western Antarctic Peninsula, one of the regions that recorded the highest air temperature increase in the planet during the last decades. The first detailed analysis of the temporal and spatial evolution of the thaw depth at the Limnopolar Lake CALM-S site is presented here, after eight years of monitoring. The average values range between 48 and 29 cm, decreasing at a ratio of 16 cm/decade. The annual thaw depth observations in the 100 x 100 m CALM grid are variable (Variability Index of 34 to 51%), although both the Variance Coefficient and the Climate Matrix Analysis Residual point to the internal consistency of the data. Those differences could be explained then by the terrain complexity and node-specific variability due to the ground properties. The interannual variability was about 60% during 2009-2012, increasing to 124% due to the presence of snow in 2013, 2015 and 2016. The snow has been proposed here as one of the most important factors controlling the spatial variability of ground thaw depth, since its values correlate with the snow thickness but also with the ground surface temperature and unconfined compression resistance, as measured in 2010. The topography explains the thaw depth spatial distribution pattern, being related to snowmelt water and its accumulation in low-elevation areas (downslope-flow). Patterned grounds and other surface features correlate well with high thaw depth patterns as well. The edaphic factor (E = 0.05842 m(2)/degrees C.day; R-2 = 0.63) is in agreement with other permafrost environments, since frozen index (F > N 0.67) and MAAT (<-2 degrees C) denote a continuous permafrost existence in the area. All these characteristics provided the basis for further comparative analyses between others nearby CALM sites. (C) 2017 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Helicoverpa armigera causes serious damage to most crops around the world. However, the impacts of snow thickness on the H. armigera overwintering pupae are little known. A field experiment was employed in 2012-2015 at Urumqi, China. At soil depths of 5, 10, and 15 cm, overwintering pupae were embedded with four treatments: no snow cover (NSC), snow cover (SC), increasing snow thickness to 1.5 times the thickness of SC (ISSC-1), and to two times the thickness of SC (ISSC-2). Results suggested that snow cover and increasing snow thickness both significantly increased soil temperatures, which helped to decrease the mortality of overwintering pupae (MOP) of H. armigera. However, the MOP did not always decrease with increases in snow thickness. The MOPs in NSC and ISSC-1 were the highest and the lowest, respectively, though ISSC-2 had much thicker snow thickness than ISSC-1. A maximum snow thickness of 60 cm might lead to the lowest MOP. The longer the snow cover duration (SCD) at a soil depth of 10 cm in March and April was, the higher the MOP was. A thicker snow cover layer led to a higher soil moisture content (SMC) and a lower diurnal soil temperature range (DSTR). The highest and the lowest MOP were at a depth of 15 and 10 cm, respectively. The SMC at the depths of 10 and 15 cm had significant effects on MOP. A lower accumulated temperature (a 0 A degrees C) led to a higher MOP. The DSTR in March of approximately 4.5 A degrees C might cause the lowest MOP. The largest influence factor for the MOPs at depths of 5 and 10 cm and the combined data were the SCDs during the whole experimental period, and for the MOPs at a depth of 15 cm was the soil temperature in November.

Accompanying the seasonal soil freeze-thaw cycle, microbial decomposition of litter exhibited different dynamic response to various snow thicknesses. In this study, we used real-time qPCR to investigate the abundance of bacteria, archaea, ammonia-oxidizing archaea (AOA) and bacteria (AOB), and the amoA gene transcripts, during the decomposition of dwarf bamboo (Fargesia nitida) litter under different snow patches at various snow-cover stages in an alpine forest on the eastern Tibetan Plateau in China. The effects of snow thickness were significant, with thicker snow patches resulting in higher microbial abundance and the amoA gene transcripts, while the degree of the effects were different. Compared with AOB, AOA were more abundant on the majority of sampling dates during the freeze-thaw period, and as well as their amoA gene transcripts. AOA are more persistent and abundant than AOB, and the higher AOA/AOB ratios were observed clearly in shrub litter and continued to decrease as the snow thickness increased, meanwhile gradually increased under uniform snow thickness over time. Our results suggested that the reduced seasonal snow cover and shortened freeze-thaw cycle periods caused by winter warming would significantly affect the ammonia oxidizers particularly tied to the ammonia oxidation process, and then could contribute to N cycle as related to litter in alpine forest ecosystems.