Terry Sohl
Terry Sohl is a Research Physical Scientist with the U.S. Geological Survey at the USGS Earth Resources Observation and Science (EROS) Center in Sioux Falls, South Dakota.
Terry Sohl serves as the acting Chief of the Integrated Science and Applications Branch. After college he began his career with the Defense Intelligence Agency at Bollings Air Force Base in Washington, DC, working with a team exploiting the use of Landsat and classified image sources to support needs of the DoD and Intelligence communities. He began his career at USGS EROS in 1993, serving as a contractor on the original team to help develop the first National Land Cover Database (NLCD) using Landsat imagery. In subsequent years, he also was on the original team that developed the Land Cover Trends project strategy and data products, assessing US land change from 1973 to 2000. With a funded NASA proposal in 2005, he initiated EROS research and development of a land-change modeling capability, developing the Forecasting Scenarios of Land Use (FORE-SCE) framework to model both historical and future land use for time periods when remote sensing data are not available. He moved from the contractor to USGS in 2009, where land-change modeling has been the core of his research interests. He's led the development of many peer-reviewed journal publications and led work on associated applications assessing feedbacks of land use and climate change on biodiversity, hydrology, carbon and greenhouse gases, and regional weather and climate. He has served as the acting Chief for the Integrated Science and Applications Branch since March of 2021, where he has emphasized a broad Monitoring, Assessment, and Projection approach to EROS science that synthesizes research and development activities across multiple projects to provide comprehensive assessments of past, present, and future US land change.
More information on the work of his land-cover modeling group at USGS EROS may be found at:
https://landcover-modeling.cr.usgs.gov/
Science and Products
The relative impacts of climate and land-use change on conterminous United States bird species from 2001 to 2075
Land cover trends dataset, 1973-2000
Development of a generic auto-calibration package for regional ecological modeling and application in the Central Plains of the United States
Spatially explicit modeling of 1992-2100 land cover and forest stand age for the conterminous United States
Geodatabase compilation of hydrogeologic, remote sensing, and water-budget-component data for the High Plains aquifer, 2011
Clarity versus complexity: land-use modeling as a practical tool for decision-makers
Land-cover change in the conterminous United States from 1973 to 2000
An integrated land change model for projecting future climate and land change scenarios
Projecting the land cover change and its environmental impacts in the Cedar River Basin in the Midwestern United States
Land use and carbon dynamics in the southeastern United States from 1992 to 2050
Coast Range Ecoregion: Chapter 1 in Status and trends of land change in the Western United States--1973 to 2000
Scenarios of land use and land cover change in the conterminous United States: Utilizing the special report on emission scenarios at ecoregional scales
Science and Products
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The relative impacts of climate and land-use change on conterminous United States bird species from 2001 to 2075
Species distribution models often use climate data to assess contemporary and/or future ranges for animal or plant species. Land use and land cover (LULC) data are important predictor variables for determining species range, yet are rarely used when modeling future distributions. In this study, maximum entropy modeling was used to construct species distribution maps for 50 North American bird specAuthorsTerry L. SohlLand cover trends dataset, 1973-2000
The U.S. Geological Survey Land Cover Trends Project is releasing a 1973–2000 time-series land-use/land-cover dataset for the conterminous United States. The dataset contains 5 dates of land-use/land-cover data for 2,688 sample blocks randomly selected within 84 ecological regions. The nominal dates of the land-use/land-cover maps are 1973, 1980, 1986, 1992, and 2000. The land-use/land-cover mapsAuthorsChristopher E. Soulard, William Acevedo, Roger F. Auch, Terry L. Sohl, Mark A. Drummond, Benjamin M. Sleeter, Daniel G. Sorenson, Steven Kambly, Tamara S. Wilson, Janis L. Taylor, Kristi Sayler, Michael P. Stier, Christopher A. Barnes, Steven C. Methven, Thomas R. Loveland, Rachel Headley, Mark S. BrooksDevelopment of a generic auto-calibration package for regional ecological modeling and application in the Central Plains of the United States
Process-oriented ecological models are frequently used for predicting potential impacts of global changes such as climate and land-cover changes, which can be useful for policy making. It is critical but challenging to automatically derive optimal parameter values at different scales, especially at regional scale, and validate the model performance. In this study, we developed an automatic calibraAuthorsYiping Wu, Shuguang Liu, Zhengpeng Li, Devendra Dahal, Claudia J. Young, Gail L. Schmidt, Jinxun Liu, Brian Davis, Terry L. Sohl, Jeremy M. Werner, Jennifer OedingSpatially explicit modeling of 1992-2100 land cover and forest stand age for the conterminous United States
Information on future land-use and land-cover (LULC) change is needed to analyze the impact of LULC change on ecological processes. The U.S. Geological Survey has produced spatially explicit, thematically detailed LULC projections for the conterminous United States. Four qualitative and quantitative scenarios of LULC change were developed, with characteristics consistent with the IntergovernmentalAuthorsTerry L. Sohl, Kristi Sayler, Michelle Bouchard, Ryan R. Reker, Aaron M. Friesz, Stacie L. Bennett, Benjamin M. Sleeter, Rachel R. Sleeter, Tamara S. Wilson, Christopher E. Soulard, Michelle Knuppe, Travis Van HofwegenGeodatabase compilation of hydrogeologic, remote sensing, and water-budget-component data for the High Plains aquifer, 2011
The High Plains aquifer underlies almost 112 million acres in the central United States. It is one of the largest aquifers in the Nation in terms of annual groundwater withdrawals and provides drinking water for 2.3 million people. The High Plains aquifer has gained national and international attention as a highly stressed groundwater supply primarily because it has been appreciably depleted in soAuthorsNatalie A. Houston, Sophia L. Gonzales-Bradford, Amanda T. Flynn, Sharon L. Qi, Steven M. Peterson, Jennifer S. Stanton, Derek W. Ryter, Terry L. Sohl, Gabriel B. SenayClarity versus complexity: land-use modeling as a practical tool for decision-makers
The last decade has seen a remarkable increase in the number of modeling tools available to examine future land-use and land-cover (LULC) change. Integrated modeling frameworks, agent-based models, cellular automata approaches, and other modeling techniques have substantially improved the representation of complex LULC systems, with each method using a different strategy to address complexity. HowAuthorsTerry L. Sohl, Peter R. ClaggettLand-cover change in the conterminous United States from 1973 to 2000
Land-cover change in the conterminous United States was quantified by interpreting change from satellite imagery for a sample stratified by 84 ecoregions. Gross and net changes between 11 land-cover classes were estimated for 5 dates of Landsat imagery (1973, 1980, 1986, 1992, and 2000). An estimated 673,000 km2(8.6%) of the United States’ land area experienced a change in land cover at least oneAuthorsBenjamin M. Sleeter, Terry L. Sohl, Thomas R. Loveland, Roger F. Auch, William Acevedo, Mark A. Drummond, Kristi Sayler, Stephen V. StehmanAn integrated land change model for projecting future climate and land change scenarios
Climate change will have myriad effects on ecosystems worldwide, and natural and anthropogenic disturbances will be key drivers of these dynamics. In addition to climatic effects, continual expansion of human settlement into fire-prone forests will alter fire regimes, increase human vulnerability, and constrain future forest management options. There is a need for modeling tools to support the simAuthorsMichael Wimberly, Terry L. Sohl, Aashis Lamsal, Zhihua Liu, Todd HawbakerProjecting the land cover change and its environmental impacts in the Cedar River Basin in the Midwestern United States
The physical surface of the Earth is in constant change due to climate forcing and human activities. In the Midwestern United States, urban area, farmland, and dedicated energy crop (e.g., switchgrass) cultivation are predicted to expand in the coming decades, which will lead to changes in hydrological processes. This study is designed to (1) project the land use and land cover (LULC) by mid-centuAuthorsYiping Wu, Shuguang Liu, Terry L. Sohl, Claudia YoungLand use and carbon dynamics in the southeastern United States from 1992 to 2050
Land use and land cover change (LUCC) plays an important role in determining the spatial distribution, magnitude, and temporal change of terrestrial carbon sources and sinks. However, the impacts of LUCC are not well understood and quantified over large areas. The goal of this study was to quantify the spatial and temporal patterns of carbon dynamics in various terrestrial ecosystems in the southeAuthorsShuqing Zhao, Shuguang Liu, Terry L. Sohl, Claudia Young, Jeremy M. WernerCoast Range Ecoregion: Chapter 1 in Status and trends of land change in the Western United States--1973 to 2000
The Coast Range Ecoregion, which covers approximately 57,338 km2 (22,138 mi2), is a thin, linear ecoregion along the Pacific Coast, stretching roughly 1,300 km from the Olympic Peninsula, in northwest Washington, to an area south of San Francisco, California (fig. 1) (Omernik, 1987; U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, 1997). It is bounded on the east by the Puget Lowland, the Willamette Valley,AuthorsTerry L. SohlScenarios of land use and land cover change in the conterminous United States: Utilizing the special report on emission scenarios at ecoregional scales
Global environmental change scenarios have typically provided projections of land use and land cover for a relatively small number of regions or using a relatively coarse resolution spatial grid, and for only a few major sectors. The coarseness of global projections, in both spatial and thematic dimensions, often limits their direct utility at scales useful for environmental management. This paperAuthorsBenjamin M. Sleeter, Terry L. Sohl, Michelle A. Bouchard, Ryan R. Reker, Christopher E. Soulard, William Acevedo, Glenn E. Griffith, Rachel R. Sleeter, Roger F. Auch, Kristi Sayler, Stephen Prisley, Zhi-Liang Zhu - Science
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