Zhang et al. (2026) Lagged Vegetation Responses to Diurnal Asymmetric Warming and Precipitation During the Growing Season in the Yellow River Basin: Patterns and Driving Mechanisms

⚠️ Warning: This summary was generated from the abstract only, as the full text was not available.

Identification

• Journal: Land
• Year: 2026
• Date: 2026-01-10
• Authors: Zeyu Zhang, F. M. Fang, Zhiming Zhang
• DOI: 10.3390/land15010146

Research Groups

Not specified in the provided text.

Short Summary

This study investigated the mechanisms behind delayed and differentiated vegetation responses to diurnally asymmetric warming and precipitation in the Yellow River Basin from 2001 to 2022, finding that vegetation greenness (NDVI) exhibited distinct lag times to daytime maximum temperature (Tmax), nighttime minimum temperature (Tmin), and precipitation, which were significantly modulated by topography, soil properties, and hydro-climatic factors.

Objective

• To clarify how vegetation responds dynamically to asymmetric temperature changes and precipitation, including their lagged effects, to better understand ecosystem resilience under future climate scenarios.

Study Configuration

• Spatial Scale: Yellow River Basin (YRB)
• Temporal Scale: Growing season, from 2001 to 2022 (22 years)

Methodology and Data

• Models used: Theil–Sen median trend estimation, Mann–Kendall test, partial correlation analysis, XGBoost–SHAP framework.
• Data sources: Growing-season Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI), daytime maximum temperature (Tmax), nighttime minimum temperature (Tmin), precipitation.

Main Results

• Growing-season climate in the YRB experienced pronounced diurnal warming asymmetry: Tmax, Tmin, and precipitation all increased, but Tmin rose substantially faster than Tmax.
• NDVI exhibited an overall increasing trend across the basin, with declines confined to only 2.72% of the area, primarily in Inner Mongolia, Ningxia, and Qinghai.
• NDVI responded to Tmax, Tmin, and precipitation with distinct average lag times of 43 days, 16 days, and 42 days, respectively.
• Lag times were strongly modulated by topography, soil properties, and hydro-climatic background.
  • Tmax lag time shortened with increasing elevation, soil silt content, and slope, and showed a decrease-then-increase pattern with potential evapotranspiration.
  • Tmin lag time lengthened with elevation, soil sand content, and soil pH, but shortened with higher potential evapotranspiration.
  • Precipitation lag time increased with soil silt content and net primary productivity, decreased with soil pH, and varied nonlinearly with elevation (decrease then increase).

Contributions

• Advances process-based understanding of climate–vegetation interactions in arid and semi-arid regions by explicitly linking diurnal warming asymmetry to vegetation response lags and their environmental controls.
• Provides a transferable framework for improving ecosystem vulnerability assessments and informing adaptive vegetation management and conservation strategies under ongoing asymmetric warming.

Funding

Not specified in the provided text.

Citation

@article{Zhang2026Lagged,
  author = {Zhang, Zeyu and Fang, F. M. and Zhang, Zhiming},
  title = {Lagged Vegetation Responses to Diurnal Asymmetric Warming and Precipitation During the Growing Season in the Yellow River Basin: Patterns and Driving Mechanisms},
  journal = {Land},
  year = {2026},
  doi = {10.3390/land15010146},
  url = {https://doi.org/10.3390/land15010146}
}