Current global changes are putting both biodiversity and the processes that depend on it at risk. This is especially true for semi-arid regions and the flagship groups that inhabit them, such as amphibians and reptiles. Semi-arid regions are often thought to have lower biodiversity and thus have been overlooked, resulting in the underestimation of their biological richness. Therefore, the aim o...

Desert dust perturbs climate by directly and indirectly interacting with incoming solar and outgoing long wave radiation, thereby changing precipitation and temperature, in addition to modifying ocean and land biogeochemistry. While we know that desert dust is sensitive to perturbations in climate and human land use, previous studies have been unable to determine whether humans were increasing ...

The 2005 DARPA Grand Challenge is a 132 mile race through the desert with autonomous robotic vehicles. Lasers mounted on the car roof provide a map of the road up to 20 meters ahead of the car but the car needs to see further in order to go fast enough to win the race. Computer vision can extend that map of the road ahead but desert road is notoriously similar to the surrounding desert. The CAR...

We use analyses of phylogeographic population structure across a suite of 12 mammalian, avian, amphibian, and reptilian species and species-groups to assess the role of Late Miocene to Pleistocene geological history in the evolution of a distinct Baja California Peninsular Desert biota. Comparative examination of phylogroup distributions provides support for previously hypothesized vicariant ev...

This paper reviews the main methodologies and techniques that have been used to characterize gypsum in soils, especially in gypsiferous soils of semiarid and arid regions and range from the identification of gypsum in soil surveys in the field to the study of gypsum in the laboratory. Many methods of gypsum identification and determination have been developed, each one with its own limitations....

Assessment of ecoenvironmental vulnerability plays an important role in the guidance of regional planning, the construction and protection of ecological environment, which requires comprehensive consideration on regional resources, environment, ecology, society and other factors. Based on the driving mechanism and evolution characteristics of ecoenvironmental vulnerability in cold and arid regi...

Accurately mapping and monitoring glacier changes over decades is important for providing information to support sustainable use of water resource in arid regions of northwest China. Since 1970, glaciers in the Eastern Altun Mountains showed remarkable recession. Further study is indispensable to indicate the extent and amplitude of glacial change at basin and individual glacier scale. In this ...

In Northwest China, aridification and desert expansion play significant roles in promoting desert plant diversification and speciation. However, to date, little is known about the effects of the desert barrier on the population structure of montane, non-desert species in the area. In this study, we sequenced chloroplast DNA regions (trnL-trnF and trnS-trnG) and a nuclear gene (rpb2) to investig...

Billions of tons of desert dust move through the atmosphere each year. The primary source regions, which include the Sahara and Sahel regions of North Africa and the Gobi and Takla Makan regions of Asia, are capable of dispersing significant quantities of desert dust across the traditionally viewed oceanic barriers. While a considerable amount of research by scientists has addressed atmospheric...

The Taklimakan Desert is located in the foreland basin of the Tibetan Plateau. We report here the results of stratigraphic investigations of a 1626-meter-thick sequence with interbedded wind-blown silt from the southern marginal Taklimakan Desert. Because the studied section is located downwind of the desert, the eolian silt accumulation is closely linked to desert formation. Our new evidence i...