近日，美国加州大学欧文分校L. O. Ohenhen团队研究了河流三角洲的全球沉降。相关论文于2026年1月14日发表在《自然》杂志上。

河流三角洲维系着全球密集的人口、重要经济中心和关键生态系统。海平面上升与地面沉降共同导致的相对海平面上升，以及随之而来的洪水、土地流失和盐碱化灾害，正威胁着这些宝贵地貌的可持续性。尽管存在这些风险，由于缺乏当代高分辨率、覆盖整个三角洲的沉降观测数据，脆弱性评估工作仍面临阻碍。

研究组通过干涉合成孔径雷达技术，展示了全球40个三角洲空间差异显著的地表高程变化。基于此数据集，他们量化了三角洲地表高程损失，揭示了全球河流三角洲沉降现象的普遍性与严重程度。对影响三角洲高程变化的三大人为驱动因素的分析表明，在40个三角洲中，有10个三角洲的垂直地面运动主要受地下水储量变化的影响。其余三角洲则受多种因素共同驱动，或以沉积物通量、城市扩张为主导因素。

此外，研究发现对于21世纪大多数三角洲而言，当代沉降已超越绝对（地心）海平面上升，成为相对海平面上升的主要驱动因素。这些发现表明，在推进减缓与适应气候变化所致全球海平面上升的宏观战略同时，亟需针对沉降这一紧迫且具有地域性的挑战采取精准干预措施。

附：英文原文

Title: Global subsidence of river deltas

Author: Ohenhen, L. O., Shirzaei, M., Davis, J. L., Tiwari, A., Nicholls, R., Dasho, O., Sadhasivam, N., Seeger, K., Werth, S., Chadwick, A. J., Onyike, F., Lucy, J., Atkins, C., Daramola, S., Ankamah, A., Minderhoud, P. S. J., Olsemann, J., Yemele, G. C.

Issue&Volume: 2026-01-14

Abstract: River deltas sustain dense human populations, major economic centres and vital ecosystems worldwide1,2. Rising sea levels and subsiding land threaten the sustainability of these valuable landscapes with relative sea-level rise and associated flood, land loss and salinization hazards1,2,3. Despite these risks, vulnerability assessments are impeded by the lack of contemporary, high-resolution, delta-wide subsidence observations4. Here we present spatially variable surface-elevation changes across 40 global deltas using interferometric synthetic aperture radar. Using this dataset, we quantify delta surface-elevation loss and show the prevalence and severity of subsidence in river deltas worldwide. Our analysis of three key anthropogenic drivers of delta elevation changes shows that groundwater storage has the strongest relative influence on vertical land motion in 10 of the 40 deltas. The other deltas are either influenced by multiple drivers or dominated by sediment flux or urban expansion. Furthermore, we find that contemporary subsidence surpasses absolute (geocentric) sea-level rise as the dominant driver of relative sea-level rise for most deltas over the twenty-first century. These findings suggest the need for targeted interventions addressing subsidence as an immediate and localized challenge, in parallel with broader efforts to mitigate and adapt to climate change-driven global sea-level rise.

DOI: 10.1038/s41586-025-09928-6

Source: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-025-09928-6