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Temperature and relative humidity profiles at Grand Falls dune field, Arizona, collected from December 2020 to April 2021

Metadata Updated: October 29, 2025

Sand covers a significant portion of the Earth’s surface, including the Grand Falls area of Coconino County, AZ. The vadose zone (unsaturated zone) in a soil is of particular interest because it is broadly applicable to desert soils, which are seldom saturated and usually dry. In the absence of strong geothermal heating, the near-surface soil temperature profile is expected to exhibit maximum variation (for a given diurnal period) at the surface, with the diurnal variations becoming successively damped with depth. The temperature at a given depth is the result of diffusive heat transport vertically within the soil column. Water vapor also is expected to be transported via diffusion through the soil column [1]. We have selected a sand sheet within the Grand Falls Dune Field (GFDF) and deployed temperature and relative humidity sensors at 5 different depths: 1, 6, 12, 24, and 48 cm to capture diurnal temperature and humidity variations. [1] Hillel, D., (1980) Fundamentals of Soil Physics

Access & Use Information

Public: This dataset is intended for public access and use. License: No license information was provided. If this work was prepared by an officer or employee of the United States government as part of that person's official duties it is considered a U.S. Government Work.

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Dates

Metadata Created Date September 12, 2025
Metadata Updated Date October 29, 2025

Metadata Source

Harvested from DOI USGS DCAT-US

Additional Metadata

Resource Type Dataset
Metadata Created Date September 12, 2025
Metadata Updated Date October 29, 2025
Publisher U.S. Geological Survey
Maintainer
Identifier http://datainventory.doi.gov/id/dataset/usgs-614b9975d34e0df5fb97c6e3
Data Last Modified 2021-09-29T00:00:00Z
Category geospatial
Public Access Level public
Bureau Code 010:12
Metadata Context https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema/catalog.jsonld
Metadata Catalog ID https://ddi.doi.gov/usgs-data.json
Schema Version https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema
Catalog Describedby https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema/catalog.json
Harvest Object Id 8cc6c38f-393a-4277-b77b-43b1d9947f18
Harvest Source Id 2b80d118-ab3a-48ba-bd93-996bbacefac2
Harvest Source Title DOI USGS DCAT-US
Metadata Type geospatial
Old Spatial -111.1681, 35.4345, -111.1680, 35.4346
Source Datajson Identifier True
Source Hash 142b4a73b53c55a1aede7751e163b1af7c876e004c4c70d6deb3bbbde5fab80e
Source Schema Version 1.1
Spatial {"type": "Polygon", "coordinates": -111.1681, 35.4345, -111.1681, 35.4346, -111.1680, 35.4346, -111.1680, 35.4345, -111.1681, 35.4345}

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