[DSRP Evidence](https://dsrpevidence.org/)

# Multilayer soil moisture depletion intensifies drought impacts on global ecosystems

## Details

**Authors** Gu et al.

**Year** 2026

**Publisher** Nature Geoscience

**Discipline** Hydrology

**Secondary disciplines** Ecology

[Read it at the publisher](https://doi.org/10.1038/s41561-026-02083-1) 
10.1038/s41561-026-02083-1

## In authors' words

### What they found (results)

Analyzing 1981–2020 global soil moisture, vertically compound (all-layer) droughts have grown longer and more frequent across over half of global land, and diagnosing drought from profile-average soil moisture overestimates compound-drought duration by about 128.3% while underestimating ecosystem productivity losses by about 27.8% relative to multilayer diagnosis.

## Commentary

### In short

Soil is treated as a layered system whose parts (individual depth layers) combine to buffer drought, and the vantage point used to measure it (single profile-average versus per-layer) changes what the drought looks like and what it predicts.

**Patterns it shows** S, R, P

**Added** 2026-09-04

**How to cite this** Gu et al. (2026). Multilayer soil moisture depletion intensifies drought impacts on global ecosystems. Nature Geoscience.