Analysis and Prediction of Ecosystems and Land Surface Processes—A Historical Perspective and a Look at Future Directions (Invited Presentation)

Early atmospheric models were coupled to the land surface as a means to close their energy and hydrological budgets within a column over land. With the realization that leaves provide important controls on these budgets, their observational and dynamical characterization became a priority. Through engagement with ecologists, the dynamics of other important and coupled ecosystem processes has also became important, allowing treatment of the terrestrial carbon cycle along with that of water and energy. Remote sensing by satellites was developed as an essential tool to provide observational constraints. The last few IPCC/CMIP simulations of the 21^st century climate change have included these coupled systems. However, their inclusion of predictions on shorter time scales, e.g. seasonal to inter-annual, have been more limited. We examine the prospects for land processes including ecosystems to become part of such predictions.