Browsing by Author "Río López, Camilo del"

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    Climate and coastal low-cloud dynamic in the hyperarid Atacama fog Desert and the geographic distribution of Tillandsia landbeckii (Bromeliaceae) dune ecosystems
    (Springer, 2021) García B., Juan Luis; Lobos Roco, Felipe Andres; Schween, Jan H.; Río López, Camilo del; Osses, Pablo; Vives Ansted, Raimundo José; Pezoa Jadue, Mariana Ignacia; Siegmund, Alexander; Latorre H., Claudio; Alfaro, Fernando; Koch, Marcus A.; Loehnert, Ulrich
    Despite the extensive area covered by the coastal Atacama fog Desert (18-32 degrees S), there is a lack of understanding of its most notorious characteristics, including fog water potential, frequency of fog presence, spatial fog gradients or fog effect in ecosystems, such as Tillandsia fields. Here we discuss new meteorological data for the foggiest season (July-August-September, JAS) in 2018 and 2019. Our meteorological stations lie between 750 and 1211 m a. s. l. at two sites within the Cordillera de la Costa in the hyperarid Atacama (20 degrees S): Cerro Oyarbide and Alto Patache. The data show steep spatial gradients together with rapid changes in the low atmosphere linked to the advection of contrasting coastal (humid and cold) and continental (dry and warm) air masses. One main implication is that fog presence and fog water yields tend to be negatively related to both distance to the coast and elevation. Strong afternoon SW winds advect moisture inland, which take the form of fog in only about 6% of the JAS at 1211 m a. s. l., but 65% at 750 m a. s. l. on the coastal cliff. Although sporadic, long lasting fog events embrace well-mixed marine boundary layer conditions and thick fog cloud between 750 and 1211 m a. s. l. These fog events are thought to be the main source of water for the Tillandsia ecosystems and relate their geographic distribution to the lowest fog water yields recorded. Future climate trends may leave fog-dependent Tillandsia even less exposed to the already infrequent fog resulting in rapid vegetation decline.
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    Fog water collection for local greenhouse vegetable production in the Atacama Desert
    (2023) Albornoz G., Francisco; Río López, Camilo del; Carter Gamberini, María Virginia; Escobar Moragas, Rodrigo; Vásquez Gimeno, Lucas Simón
    Agricultural production in the Atacama Desert is restricted by extreme aridity and poor soil quality. Between 18° S and 30° S, low stratocumulus clouds regularly cover the southeastern Pacific Ocean reaching the Coastal Cordillera. Thus, marine fog is constantly present in the coastal areas of the desert. Fog can be harvested using fog collectors. However, limited information is available with regards to the variability of fog presence throughout the year and along the coast of the desert. Combining fog water harvest with hydroponic production under greenhouse facilities presents an alternative for sustainable and local fresh food production. In this article, we analyze the potential of fog water collection in two sites (Alto Patache and Falda Verde) distant by about 1000 km within the Atacama Desert. Additionally, in both locations, the environmental conditions within greenhouse structures, the potential energy requirement for environmental conditioning (including the energy production from photovoltaic panels) and the water requirements of vegetable crops under greenhouse conditions were modeled. The annual average of fog water collection registered was 2.9 and 3.3 L per day per m2 in Alto Patache and Falda Verde, respectively. During the most demanding season for crop evapotranspiration, 2.13 m2 of fog collectors can supply the water required for 1 m2 of greenhouse crops. The energy required for water and air pumps in the hydroponic systems can be supplied with photovoltaic systems including eight PV modules and a battery storage capacity of 9.4 kWh. In conclusion, the present study sheds light on the possibilities of massive water collection from fog to be used in local and sustainable food production in the Atacama Desert.
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    Mammalian bioturbation amplifies rates of both hillslope sediment erosion and accumulation along the Chilean climate gradient
    (Copernicus Gesellschaft MBH, 2023) Grigusova, Paulina; Larsen, Annegret; Brandl, Roland; Río López, Camilo del; Farwig, Nina; Kraus, Diana; Paulino, Leandro; Pliscoff, Patricio; Bendix, Joerg
    Animal burrowing activity affects soil texture, bulk density, soil water content, and redistribution of nutrients. All of these parameters in turn influence sediment redistribution, which shapes the earth's surface. Hence it is important to include bioturbation into hillslope sediment transport models. However, the inclusion of burrowing animals into hillslope-wide models has thus far been limited and has largely omitted vertebrate bioturbators, which can be major agents of bioturbation, especially in drier areas.Here, we included vertebrate bioturbator burrows into a semi-empirical Morgan-Morgan-Finney soil erosion model to allow a general approach to the assessment of the impacts of bioturbation on sediment redistribution within four sites along the Chilean climate gradient. For this, we predicted the distribution of burrows by applying machine learning techniques in combination with remotely sensed data in the hillslope catchment. Then, we adjusted the spatial model parameters at predicted burrow locations based on field and laboratory measurements. We validated the model using field sediment fences. We estimated the impact of bioturbator burrows on surface processes. Lastly, we analyzed how the impact of bioturbation on sediment redistribution depends on the burrow structure, climate, topography, and adjacent vegetation.Including bioturbation greatly increased model performance and demonstrates the overall importance of vertebrate bioturbators in enhancing both sediment erosion and accumulation along hillslopes, though this impact is clearly staggered according to climatic conditions. Burrowing vertebrates increased sediment accumulation by 137.8 % +/- 16.4 % in the arid zone (3.53 kg ha(-1) yr(-1) vs. 48.79 kg ha(-1) yr(-1)), sediment erosion by 6.5 % +/- 0.7 % in the semi-arid zone (129.16 kg ha(-1) yr(-1) vs. 122.05 kg ha(-1) yr(-1)), and sediment erosion by 15.6 % +/- 0.3 % in the Mediterranean zone (4602.69 kg ha(-1) yr(-1) vs. 3980.96 kg ha(-1) yr(-1)). Bioturbating animals seem to play only a negligible role in the humid zone. Within all climate zones, bioturbation did not uniformly increase erosion or accumulation within the whole hillslope catchment. This depended on adjusting environmental parameters. Bioturbation increased erosion with increasing slope, sink connectivity, and topography ruggedness and decreasing vegetation cover and soil wetness. Bioturbation increased sediment accumulation with increasing surface roughness, soil wetness, and vegetation cover.
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    Soil bacterial community structure of fog-dependent Tillandsia landbeckii dunes in the Atacama Desert
    (Springer, 2021) Alfaro, Fernando D.; Manzano, Marlene; Almiray, Cristian; García B., Juan Luis; Osses, Pablo; Río López, Camilo del; Vargas Vásquez, Constanza Giovanna; Latorre H., Claudio; Koch, Marcus A.; Siegmund, Alexander; Abades, Sebastian
    The interplay between plants and soil drives the structure and function of soil microbial communities. In water-limited environments where vascular plants are often absent and only specialized groups of rootless plants grow, this interaction could be mainly asymmetric, with plants supporting nutrients and resources via litter deposition. In this study, we use observational approaches to evaluate the impact of local distribution of Tillandsia landbeckii across elevation on soil bacterial community structure and composition in the Atacama Fog Desert. Tillandsia landbeckii is a plant without functional roots that develops on meter-scale sand dunes and depends mainly on marine fog that transports resources (water and nutrients) from the Pacific Ocean. Our data show that soil bacterial abundance, richness, and diversity were significantly higher beneath T. landbeckii plants relative to bare soils. However, these differences were not significant across T. landbeckii located at different elevations and with different input of marine fog. On the other hand, bacterial community composition was significantly different with T. landbeckii plants across elevations. Further, samples beneath T. landbeckii and bare soils showed significant differences in bacterial community composition. Around 99% of all operational taxonomic units (OTUs) were recorded exclusively beneath T. landbeckii, and only 1% of OTUs were observed in bare soils. These findings suggest that the presence of T. landbeckii promotes significant increases in bacterial abundance and diversity compared with bare soils, although we fail to demonstrate that local-scale changes in elevation can affect patterns of soil bacterial diversity and abundance beneath T. landbeckii.