Changes in the lake thermal and mixing dynamics on the Tibetan Plateau

ABSTRACT

The thermal regimes of lakes are important for understanding the functions and services of lake ecosystems. However, continuous lake temperature monitoring across the Tibetan Plateau is sparse, which inhibits verification of modeling results and also in-depth understanding of the lake thermal and mixing dynamics in this region. Here, we present the results of continuous temperature monitoring of a dimictic lake, Bangong Co, during 2012–2014, and a meromictic lake, Dagze Co, during 2012–2015, to gain insight into the differences in their thermal dynamics and to understand the factors influencing these differences. No evident changes in the thermal and mixing regimes were observed at the two lakes during the observational period. However, the thermal structure changed in different hydrological years. The air temperature changes and associated glacier melt possibly contribute to changes in the water temperature for Bangong Co, while heat transfer related to wind speed is vital for Dagze Co. Developing in-depth knowledge necessitates long-term monitoring data to confirm the influence of various individual climatic parameters.

KEYWORDS:

• water temperature monitoring
• lake stratification and mixing
• Tibetan Plateau
• Bangong Co
• Dagze Co

Editor A. Castellarin ; Associate editor K. Kochanek

Editor A. Castellarin ; Associate editor K. Kochanek

Acknowledgements

The authors thank Dr Yue He, Mr Erlei Zhu and Mr Maohui Liang for their assistance in retrieving the temperature loggers deployed at the two lakes, and thank Dr Junbo Wang and Dr Yanbin Lei for providing bathymetry data of Bangong Co and lake level data of Dagze Co, respectively. We appreciate Prof. Hucai Zhang and two anonymous reviewers for thoughtful advice and constructive comments. This work was financially supported by the National Key R&D Program of China (Grant No. 2018YFA0606400), Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 41601205) and China Postdoctoral Science Foundation (Grant No. 2016M590142).

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the National Key Research & Development Program of China [2018YFA0606400]; National Natural Science Foundation of China [41601205]; China Postdoctoral Science Foundation [2016M590142].