Mesopotamian Marshlands Database
Welcome to the Mesopotamian Marshlands Database web page, your site for visualizing geoscientific data for the Tigris and Euphrates River's Watershed. This database is designed for use by researchers as well as educators and students. It was first posted in August 2005 and will be updated frequently.
Location
The Mesopotamian Marshlands are located in southern Iraq, and south-west Iran, but the watershed for the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers (hachured in blue) cross the boundaries of Turkey, Syria, Iraq, and Iran. The Mesopotamian Marshlands area is located in the southwest portion of Iraq, and southeast portion of Iran. (shown by black box)
Description
The Tigris and Euphrates watershed covers an area of nearly 1 million km2 and crosses the borders of 6 countries. This section of the globe is renowned in history as the "cradle of civilization." Due to engineering efforts by the riparian countries of the watershed, there have been many Land Cover Land Use Changes (LCLUC) experienced throughout the entire watershed, however the effects of these engineering projects has been especially noticeable in the Mesopotamian Marshlands Region. Current research efforts are aimed at understanding the role that these engineering projects have played in the desiccation of the marshlands.
Remote sensing data available
Shuttle Radar Topographic Mission (SRTM)
Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS)
Landsat Thematic Mapper (TM)
Coming Soon
CORONA dataset 1969
TRMM datasets 1998-Present
SSM/I datasets 1987-1998
References
Aydogu, 2000, Dams for development in Turkey, Southeastern Anatolia Project GAP, in Workshop Proceedings on Dams, Development and Environment, 14-16 February, Sao Paulo, Brazil.
Beaumont, P., 1996, Agricultural and environmental changes in the upper Euphrates catchment of Turkey and Syria and their political and economic implications, in Applied Geography, vol., 16, no. 2, pp 137-157, Pergamon, UK.
Basgall, M., 2003, DUWC joins Iraqi Marsh Restoration Project, Wetland Wire, vol. 6, no. 2, p. 1,3.
Italian Ministry for the Environment and Territory (IMET), 2004, The New Eden Project: Final Report, United Nations CSD-12, New York, April 14-30, 2004.
Koeppel, I., 2001, Location services are here now: ArcUser, p. 14-17.
MacQuarrie, P., 2004, Water Security in the Middle East: Growing Conflict Over Development in the Euphrates-Tigris Basin, M.S. thesis, Trinity College, Dublin, Ireland.
Sultan, M., Becker, R., Al-Dousari, A., Al-Ghadban, A., and Bufano, E., 2003a, Water, agriculture, and landcover: Lessons for the post-war era, Geotimes (October issue).
UNNEP, 2001, The Mesopotamian Marshlands: Demise of an ecosystem, Early warning and assessment report, UNEP/DEWA/TR.01-3 Rev.1, Division of Early Warning and Assessment, Nations Environmental Programme, Nairobi, Kenya.
Collaborators
Ahmad Al-Dousari – Kuwait Institute for Scientific Research (KISR)
Dr. Sabbar Abdullah Salih Al-Kaisy , University of Tikrit.
Dr. Lifta Salman Kadem, University of Tikrit.
Funded by NSF, Award #0455896
