Sandstorm is a disastrous weather phenomenon that often occurs in arid and semi-arid areas, endangering the ecological environment and affecting people's lives and property safety seriously. Since the 21st century, the sandstorm weather in the Yellow River Basin has ameliorated obviously. However, the causes of the long-term trends in sandstorms during 21st century were still unknown. In this study, fifteen influencing factors from five aspects: ecology, meteorology, hydrology, geography and man-made were selected to comprehensively analyze the driving mechanism of sandstorm activities in the Yellow River Basin since the 21st century, and the effect of each influencing factor on sandstorm weather was quantified. The results indicated that ecological, meteorological and geographical factors had dominant impacts on the spatio-temporal variation of sandstorms during 2000–2021, while hydrological and human factors played little role in the long-term variation of sandstorms. Sandstorms frequently occurred in semi-desert or grassland or non-high vegetation covered areas in spring. Vegetation coverage, precipitation, surface pressure, surface roughness, and soil moisture content were negatively correlated with sandstorms, while wind speed, friction velocity, evaporation, and soil temperature were positively correlated with sandstorms. Precipitation, runoff, evaporation, soil moisture content, soil temperature, and surface temperature indirectly acted on normalized brightness temperature dust index (NBTDI) and sandstorms by changing soil texture. Normalized Vegetation Index (NDVI) had direct negative effects on NBTDI, while wind speed 10 m (WS10m), slope of sub-gridscale orography (SOSGO), and forecast surface roughness (FSR) had direct positive effects on NBTDI. This study comprehensively revealed the dominant factors and their driving mechanism of sandstorm weather in the Yellow River Basin since the 21st century, which had practical application value for the prevention of sandstorms.

中文翻译：

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量化主导因素对长期沙尘暴天气的影响 —— 2000—2021 年黄河流域案例研究


沙尘暴是一种灾害性天气现象，经常发生在干旱和半干旱地区，危害生态环境，严重影响人们的生命财产安全。21 世纪以来，黄河流域的沙尘暴天气明显好转。然而，21 世纪沙尘暴长期趋势的原因仍然未知。本研究从生态学、气象学、水文、地理学和人为5个方面选取15个影响因素，综合分析了21世纪以来黄河流域沙尘暴活动的驱动机制，并量化了各影响因素对沙尘暴天气的影响。结果表明：生态、气象和地理因素对 2000—2021 年沙尘暴时空变化具有主导影响，而水文和人为因素对沙尘暴的长期变化影响较小。春季，半沙漠或草原或植被覆盖率不高的地区经常发生沙尘暴。植被覆盖度、降水量、地表压力、表面粗糙度和土壤含水量与沙尘暴呈负相关，而风速、摩擦速度、蒸发和土壤温度与沙尘暴呈正相关。降水、径流、蒸发、土壤含水量、土壤温度和表面温度通过改变土壤质地间接影响归一化亮温尘埃指数 （NBTDI） 和沙尘暴。归一化植被指数 （NDVI） 对 NBTDI 有直接的负向影响，而风速 10 m （WS10m） 、亚网格尺度地形坡度 （SOSGO） 和预报表面粗糙度 （FSR） 对 NBTDI 有直接的正向影响。 本研究全面揭示了 21 世纪以来黄河流域沙尘暴天气的主导因素及其驱动机制，对沙尘暴的防治具有实际应用价值。