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CosmOz - The Australian Cosmic-ray Soil Moisture Sensor Network

The Australian cosmic-ray soil moisture monitoring network was first established in 2010 to provide Australian and global researchers with spatially distributed intermediate scale soil moisture observations. A cosmic-ray sensor (CRS) provides continuous estimates of soil moisture over an area of approximately 30 hectares by measuring naturally generated fast neutrons (energy 10–1000 eV) that are produced by cosmic rays passing through the Earth’s atmosphere. The neutron intensity above the land surface is inversely correlated with soil moisture as it responds to the hydrogen contained in the soil and to a lesser degree to plant and soil carbon compounds. The cosmic-ray technique is also passive, non-contact, and is largely insensitive to bulk density, surface roughness, the physical state of water, and soil texture. The scale of CRS measurements fills the void between point scale sensor measurements and large scale satellite observations. The depth of measurements varies with the moisture content of the soil but is typically between 10-30 cm. The depth of observations is reported as ‘effective depth’. <br>


The CosmOz network is expanding as new sensors are added over time. The initial network was funded by CSIRO Land and Water but more recently TERN has funded work to maintain the network add new sensors and deliver data more efficiently. The standard CRS installation includes; a cosmic-ray neutron tube, a rain gauge (2m high), temperature and humidity sensors, and an atmospheric pressure sensor. Measures of all parameters are reported at an hourly interval. Each CRS requires an in-field calibration across the footprint of measurements to convert neutron counts to soil moisture content. The calibration includes collection of soil samples for bulk density, lattice water content and soil organic carbon.<br>

The Australia CosmOz network consists of <a href=" https://cosmoz.csiro.au/sites ">19 stations</a>. The extent of the network and available data can be seen at the CosmOz network web page: <a href=" https://cosmoz.csiro.au/ "> https://cosmoz.csiro.au </a>. The data is also accessible from the <a href=" https://landscapes-cosmoz-api.tern.org.au/rest/doc ">TERN Cosmoz REST API</a>.<br>


The calibration and correction procedures used by the network are described by <a href=" https://doi.org/10.1002/2013WR015138 ">Hawdon et al. 2014 </a>.

Simple

Identification info

Date (Creation)
2020-03-19
Date (Publication)
2021-10-25
Date (Revision)
2025-12-10
Edition
1.0

Identifier

Title
DataCite
Code
doi:10.25901/5e7ab81af0394
Codespace
http://dx.doi.org

Publisher

Terrestrial Ecosystem Research Network
Building 1019, 80 Meiers Rd
Indooroopilly
QLD
4068
Australia
+61 7 3365 9097

Co-author

CSIRO Land and Water (2014-2022) - Stenson, Matt (Team Leader, Environmental Informatics)
147 Underwood Avenue, Floreat, Western Australia, 6014, Australia
Floreat
Western Australia
6014
Australia

Author

CSIRO Land and Water (2014-2022) - McJannet, David (Principal Research Scientist)
147 Underwood Avenue, Floreat, Western Australia, 6014, Australia
Floreat
Western Australia
6014
Australia

Co-author

CSIRO Land and Water (2014-2022) - Sommer, Ashley ()
147 Underwood Avenue, Floreat, Western Australia, 6014, Australia
Floreat
Western Australia
6014
Australia

Co-author

CSIRO Land and Water (2014-2022) - Hawdon, Aarond ()
147 Underwood Avenue, Floreat, Western Australia, 6014, Australia
Floreat
Western Australia
6014
Australia
Website
https://www.tern.org.au/

Purpose
The purpose of the data from the CosmOz network is to provide long-term, intermediate-scale soil moisture estimates at an hourly time-interval across different environments in Australia.
Credit
We at TERN acknowledge the Traditional Owners and Custodians throughout Australia, New Zealand and all nations. We honour their profound connections to land, water, biodiversity and culture and pay our respects to their Elders past, present and emerging.
Credit
This work was jointly funded by the Terrestrial Ecosystem Research Network (TERN), an Australian Government National Collaborative Research Infrastructure Strategy (NCRIS) project, and the Queensland Government Research Infrastructure Co-investment Fund (RICF).
Status
On going

Point of contact

CSIRO Land and Water (2014-2022) - McJannet, David (Principal Research Scientist)
147 Underwood Avenue, Floreat, Western Australia, 6014, Australia
147 Underwood Avenue
Floreat
Western Australia
6014
Australia
Topic category
  • Climatology, meteorology, atmosphere
  • Environment
  • Location

Extent

Description
The CosmOz network extends across Australia. See cosmoz.csiro.au for sensor locations.
N
S
E
W


Temporal extent

Time period
2011-10-28
Title
Hawdon, A, McJannet, D, & Wallace, J 2014, Calibration and correction procedures for cosmic-ray neutron soil moisture probes located across Australia. Water Resources Research, Vol. 50, pp.5029-5043. doi:10.1002/2013wr015138
Website
Hawdon, A, McJannet, D, & Wallace, J 2014, Calibration and correction procedures for cosmic-ray neutron soil moisture probes located across Australia. Water Resources Research, Vol. 50, pp.5029-5043. doi:10.1002/2013wr015138

Related documentation

Title
Metadata of data levels and attributes
Website
Metadata of data levels and attributes

Related documentation

Maintenance and update frequency
continually
GCMD Science Keywords
  • SOIL BULK DENSITY
  • SOIL MOISTURE/WATER CONTENT
  • SOIL MOISTURE
  • PRECIPITATION AMOUNT
ANZSRC Fields of Research
  • Surface water hydrology
  • Agricultural land management
  • High energy astrophysics and galactic cosmic rays
TERN Platform Vocabulary
  • Baldry CosmOz station
  • Daly CosmOz station
  • Gnangara CosmOz station
  • Griffith CosmOz station
  • RobsonCk CosmOz station
  • Temora CosmOz station
  • Tullochgorum CosmOz station
  • Tumbarumba CosmOz station
  • WeanyCk CosmOz station
  • Yanco CosmOz station
  • NamadgiPark CosmOz station
  • MineralBanks CosmOz station
  • Hamilton CosmOz station
  • Bishes CosmOz station
  • Bennets CosmOz station
  • Bullawarrie CosmOz station
  • ScottsPeak CosmOz station
  • BCS Conservatively Grazed (C3) CosmOz station
  • BCS Brigalow Woodland (C1) CosmOz station
  • BCS Heavily Grazed (C5) CosmOz station
TERN Instrument Vocabulary
  • HyQuest Solutions TB3
  • Q-NPM Neutron Pulse Detector Module
  • CR-2000B Cosmic-Ray Neutron Sensor
  • Q-DL-2100 Data Logger
  • CR-1000B Cosmic-Ray Neutron Sensor
TERN Parameter Vocabulary
  • precipitation amount
  • Millimetre
  • air pressure
  • Millibar
  • air temperature
  • Degree Celsius
  • relative humidity
  • Percent
  • volume fraction of condensed water in soil
  • Unitless
  • soil depth
  • Centimetre
QUDT Units of Measure
  • Millimetre
  • Millibar
  • Degree Celsius
  • Percent
  • Unitless
  • Centimetre
GCMD Horizontal Resolution Ranges
  • Point Resolution
GCMD Temporal Resolution Ranges
  • Hourly - < Daily
Keywords (Discipline)
  • cosmic-ray soil moisture
  • rainfall
  • neutron counts

Resource constraints

Use limitation
The Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0) license allows others to copy, distribute, display, and create derivative works provided that they credit the original source and any other nominated parties. Details are provided at https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
File name
88x31.png
File description
CCBy Logo from creativecommons.org
File type
png
Linkage
https://w3id.org/tern/static/cc-by/88x31.png

Title
Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International Licence
Alternate title
CC-BY
Edition
4.0
Website
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

Access constraints
License
Use constraints
Other restrictions
Other constraints
TERN services are provided on an "as-is" and "as available" basis. Users use any TERN services at their discretion and risk. They will be solely responsible for any damage or loss whatsoever that results from such use including use of any data obtained through TERN and any analysis performed using the TERN infrastructure. <br />Web links to and from external, third party websites should not be construed as implying any relationships with and/or endorsement of the external site or its content by TERN. <br /><br />Please advise any work or publications that use this data via the online form at https://www.tern.org.au/research-publications/#reporting
Other constraints
Please cite this dataset as {Author} ({PublicationYear}). {Title}. {Version, as appropriate}. Terrestrial Ecosystem Research Network. Dataset. {Identifier}.
Other constraints
Please cite this paper if using the data: Hawdon, A, McJannet, D, & Wallace, J 2014, Calibration and correction procedures for cosmic-ray neutron soil moisture probes located across Australia. Water Resources Research, Vol. 50, pp.5029-5043. doi:10.1002/2013wr015138

Resource constraints

Classification
Unclassified
Supplemental Information
Neutron intensity data for neutron intensity corrections are supplied by the Neutron Monitor Database (https://www.nmdb.eu/)

Distribution Information

Distribution format

Distributor

Distributor

Terrestrial Ecosystem Research Network
80 Meiers Road, Indooroopilly, Queensland, 4068, Australia
Indooroopilly
Queensland
4068
Australia
OnLine resource
Cosmoz REST API

OnLine resource
Metadata of All CSIRO Cosmoz Sites

OnLine resource
Data Visualisation

OnLine resource
Landscapes Data Visualiser - CosmOz

OnLine resource
CosmOz - The Australian Cosmic-ray Soil Moisture Sensor Network

OnLine resource
ro-crate-metadata.json

Data quality info

Hierarchy level
Dataset
Other
The cosmic-ray sensor is calibrated with collection of soil cores in the field. In total 72 soil cores are collected from location at different radial distances from the sensor and at different depth in the profile. Data is delivered with 5 levels of processing to maintain data integrity. These levels are: 'Raw Data' - data as it comes straight from the station, 'Level 1' - data with high and low neutron counts flagged and low battery flagged, 'Level 2' - data with corrections for atmospheric humidity, atmospheric pressure and incoming neutron intensity, 'Level 3' - calculated soil moisture content, depth of measurement and rainfall, and 'Level 4' - final high quality data including a 7-hour moving average. Refer to <a href="https://doi.org/10.1002/2013WR015138">Hawdon et al. 2014 </a>.

Report

Result

Statement
Measurement precision increases with the number of neutron counts as neutron intensity follows Poisson statistics. The longer the averaging the less the uncertainty in soil moisture observations. Modelling suggests that uncertainty is typically in the order of 0.03 m^3/m^3.

Reference System Information

Reference system identifier
EPSG/EPSG:4326

Reference system type
Geodetic Geographic 2D

Metadata

Metadata identifier
urn:uuid/3567cff4-4a73-439e-a1b4-d30caf3c8959

Title
TERN GeoNetwork UUID

Language
English
Character encoding
UTF8

Point of contact

Terrestrial Ecosystem Research Network
Building 1019, 80 Meiers Rd
Indooroopilly
QLD
4068
Australia
+61 7 3365 9097

Type of resource

Resource scope
Dataset
Metadata linkage
https://geonetwork.tern.org.au/geonetwork/srv/eng/catalog.search#/metadata/3567cff4-4a73-439e-a1b4-d30caf3c8959

Point-of-truth metadata URL

Date info (Creation)
2020-03-19T00:00:00.000000+00:00
Date info (Revision)
2025-12-10T10:32:27.316324+00:00

Metadata standard

Title
ISO 19115-1:2014/AMD 1:2018 Geographic information - Metadata - Fundamentals
Edition
1

Metadata standard

Title
ISO/TS 19115-3:2016
Edition
1.0

Metadata standard

Title
ISO/TS 19157-2:2016
Edition
1.0
Title
Terrestrial Ecosystem Research Network (TERN) Metadata Profile of ISO 19115-3:2016 and ISO 19157-2:2016
Date (published)
2021
Edition
1.0

Identifier

Code
10.5281/zenodo.5652221
Website
https://github.com/ternaustralia/TERN-ISO19115/releases/tag/v1.0

 
 

Overviews

Spatial extent

N
S
E
W


Keywords

ANZSRC Fields of Research
Agricultural land management High energy astrophysics and galactic cosmic rays Surface water hydrology
GCMD Science Keywords
PRECIPITATION AMOUNT SOIL BULK DENSITY SOIL MOISTURE SOIL MOISTURE/WATER CONTENT

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