| Research Articles |
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| Near-surface sand-dust horizontal flux in Tazhong—the hinterland of the Taklimakan Desert |
| XingHua YANG1,2, Qing HE1,2, Mamtimin ALI1,2, Wen HUO1,2, XinChun LIU1,2 |
1 Institute of Desert Meteorology, China Meteorological Administration, Urumqi 830002, China;
2 Desert Atmosphere and Environment Observation Experiment of Taklimakan Station, Tazhong 841000, China |
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Abstract Tazhong is the hinterland and a sandstorm high-frequency area of the Taklimakan Desert. However, little is known about the detailed time-series of aeolian sand transport in this area. An experiment to study the sand-dust horizontal flux of near-surface was carried out in Tazhong from January to December 2009. By measuring the sand-dust horizontal flux throughout sixteen sand-dust weather processes with a 200-cm tall Big Spring Number Eight (BSNE) sampler tower, we quantitatively analyzed the vertical variation of the sand-dust horizontal flux. And the total sand-dust horizontal flux of different time-series that passed through a section of 100 cm in width and 200 cm in height was estimated combining the data of saltation movement continuously recorded by piezo-electric saltation sensors (Sensit). The results indicated that, in the surface layer ranging from 0–200 cm, the intensity of sand-dust horizontal flux decreased with the increase of the height, and the physical quantities obeyed power function well. The total sand-dust horizontal flux of the sixteen sand-dust weather processes that passed through a section of 100 cm in width and 200 cm in height was about 2,144.9 kg, the maximum of one sand-dust weather event was about 396.3 kg, and the annual total sand-dust horizontal flux was about 3,903.2 kg. The high levels of aeolian sand transport occurred during daytime, especially from 13:00 to 16:00 in the afternoon. We try to develop a new method for estimation of the detailed time-series of aeolian sand transport.
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Received: 26 June 2012
Published: 01 June 2013
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| Fund: The National Natural Science Foundation of China (41175017), the Central Scientific Research Institute of the public basic scientific research business professional ( IDM201103), and the R&D Special Fund for Public Welfare Industry (Meteorology) (GYHY201106025) |
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Corresponding Authors:
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