Increasing atmospheric evaporative demand across the Tibetan plateau and implications for surface water resources.

The Tibetan Plateau, known as the "Asian water tower," is a hotspot for complex hydroclimatic changes. We reveal that the previously decreasing atmospheric evaporative demand ( ) trend at the end of the 20 century has reversed over the last two decades. Although both wind stilling and solar dimming have persisted, their effects on rates have been overshadowed by increasing air temperatures and decreasing relative humidity, leading to a net rise in for 1980-2015.

California's 2023 snow deluge: Contextualizing an extreme snow year against future climate change.

The increasing prevalence of low snow conditions in a warming climate has attracted substantial attention in recent years, but a focus exclusively on low snow leaves high snow years relatively underexplored. However, these large snow years are hydrologically and economically important in regions where snow is critical for water resources. Here, we introduce the term "snow deluge" and use anomalously high snowpack in California's Sierra Nevada during the 2023 water year as a case study.

Association between wildfires and coccidioidomycosis incidence in California, 2000-2018: a synthetic control analysis.

Unlabelled: The frequency and severity of wildfires in the Western United States have increased over recent decades, motivating hypotheses that wildfires contribute to the incidence of coccidioidomycosis, an emerging fungal disease in the Western United States with sharp increases in incidence observed since 2000. While coccidioidomycosis outbreaks have occurred among wildland firefighters clearing brush, it remains unknown whether fires are associated with an increased incidence among the general population.

Methods: We identified 19 wildfires occurring within California's highly endemic San Joaquin Valley between 2003 and 2015.

Watershed memory amplified the Oroville rain-on-snow flood of February 2017.

Mountain snowpacks are transitioning to experience less snowfall and more rainfall as the climate warms, creating more persistent low- to no-snow conditions. This precipitation shift also invites more high-impact rain-on-snow (ROS) events, which have historically yielded many of the largest and most damaging floods in the western United States. One such sequence of events preceded the evacuation of 188,000 residents below the already-damaged Oroville Dam spillway in February 2017 in California's Sierra Nevada.

Effects of precipitation, heat, and drought on incidence and expansion of coccidioidomycosis in western USA: a longitudinal surveillance study.

Background: Drought is an understudied driver of infectious disease dynamics. Amidst the ongoing southwestern North American megadrought, California (USA) is having the driest multi-decadal period since 800 CE, exacerbated by anthropogenic warming. In this study, we aimed to examine the influence of drought on coccidioidomycosis, an emerging infectious disease in southwestern USA.