Land surface models (LSMs) are a vital tool for understanding, projecting, and predicting the dynamics of the land surface and its role within the Earth system, under global change. Driven by the need to address a set of key questions, LSMs have grown in complexity from simplified representations of land surface biophysics to encompass a broad set of interrelated processes spanning the disciplines of biophysics, biogeochemistry, hydrology, ecosystem ecology, community ecology, human management, and societal impacts. This vast scope and complexity, while warranted by the problems LSMs are designed to solve, has led to enormous challenges in understanding and attributing differences between LSM predictions. Meanwhile, the wide range of spatial scales that govern land surface heterogeneity, and the broad spectrum of timescales in land surface dynamics, create challenges in tractably representing processes in LSMs. We identify three “grand challenges” in the development and use of LSMs, based around these issues: managing process complexity, representing land surface heterogeneity, and understanding parametric dynamics across the broad set of problems asked of LSMs in a changing world. In this review, we discuss progress that has been made, as well as promising directions forward, for each of these challenges.

中文翻译：

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关于土地表面模型的未来以及代表复杂陆地系统的挑战的观点

地表模型（LSM）是了解，预测和预测全球变化下的地表动力学及其在地球系统中的作用的重要工具。在需要解决一系列关键问题的推动下，LSM的复杂性从简化的陆地表面生物物理表示法发展到涵盖了一系列相互关联的过程，涵盖了生物物理，生物地球化学，水文学，生态系统生态学，社区生态学，人类管理等学科。以及社会影响。尽管LSM旨在解决这些问题，但这种广泛的范围和复杂性给理解和归因于LSM预测之间的差异带来了巨大的挑战。同时，控制土地表面异质性的各种空间尺度，以及陆地表面动力学的各种时标，在以生动的方式表示LSM中的过程方面都带来了挑战。基于这些问题，我们确定了LSM的开发和使用中的三个“巨大挑战”：管理流程的复杂性，代表陆地表面的异质性，以及在不断变化的世界中了解LSM所提出的一系列广泛问题中的参数动态。在这篇综述中，我们讨论了针对每个挑战所取得的进展以及有希望的方向。以及在不断变化的世界中了解LSM所提出的一系列广泛问题中的参数动力学。在这篇综述中，我们讨论了针对每个挑战所取得的进展以及有希望的方向。以及在不断变化的世界中了解LSM所提出的一系列广泛问题中的参数动力学。在这篇综述中，我们讨论了针对每个挑战所取得的进展以及有希望的方向。