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Growth of the Sayram Lake and retreat of its water-supplying glaciers in the Tianshan Mountains from 1972 to 2011

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Abstract

Inland lakes and alpine glaciers are important constituents of water resources in arid and semiarid regions. Understanding their variations is critical for both an accurate evaluation of the dynamic changes of water resources and the retrieval of climatic information. On the basis of earlier researches, this study investigated the growth of the Sayram Lake and the retreat of its water-supplying glaciers in the Tianshan Mountains using long-term sequenced remote sensing images. Our results show that over the past 40 years, the surface area and the water level of the lake has increased by 12.0±0.3 km2 and 2.8 m, respectively, and the area of its water-supplying glaciers has decreased continuously since the early 1970s with a total reduction of about–2.13±0.03 km2. Our study has indicative significance to the research of regional climate change.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. State Key Laboratory of Resources and Environmental Information System, Institute of Geographic Sciences and Natural Resources Research, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, 100101, China

    Weiming Cheng, Nan Wang, Yue Fang & Min Zhao

  2. University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, 100049, China

    Nan Wang, Yue Fang & Min Zhao

  3. Department of Surveying and Mapping, College of Mining Engineering, Taiyuan University of Technology, Taiyuan, 030024, China

    Shangmin Zhao

  4. Xinjiang Institute of Ecology and Geography, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Urumqi, 830011, China

    Yue Fang

Authors
  1. Weiming Cheng
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  2. Nan Wang
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  3. Shangmin Zhao
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  4. Yue Fang
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  5. Min Zhao
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Correspondence to Weiming Cheng.

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Cheng, W., Wang, N., Zhao, S. et al. Growth of the Sayram Lake and retreat of its water-supplying glaciers in the Tianshan Mountains from 1972 to 2011. J. Arid Land 8, 13–22 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s40333-015-0139-4

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s40333-015-0139-4

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