Deforestation effects on land surface energy coupling: a data-driven perspective

Deforestation dramatically alters land surface properties and functions through multiple biogeophysical and biogeochemical pathways. However, a quantitative identification of how deforestation affects local energy-water-vegetation coupling is still challenging. In this study we employed information theory and transfer entropy framework to identify the overall feedback pattern of land surface water-energy-vegetation coupling, using high frequency eddy covariance measurements at forested versus deforested sites. We found that deforestation strengthened the directional influence of atmospheric demand on land surface water flux, and more importantly, deforestation broke the coupling between vegetation activities and local precipitation, which led to a less efficient ecosystem to recycle and maintain water within this system.