Hydro-Geophysical Characterization of Unsaturated Zone

Understanding the processes involved for the movement of moisture and characterizing various controlling parameters through unsaturated zone are implemented in this research work. In terms of application, unsaturated zone is the principal area and my primary focus was on estimating the recharge and the movement of rainfall as natural recharge. The importance of unsaturated zone is highlighted in the work completed and it is supported that recharge is the most important component of groundwater balance. I carried out both theoretical and field studies to pursue the doctoral thesis towards relationship between electrical resistivity and soil moisture in the unsaturated zone of hard rock terrenes. TLERT experiment was designed for one monsoon cycle to monitor and characterize the rainfall events. This has led to the mapping of the moisture movement from the surface to the saturated zone through the unsaturated zone. I developed a new methodology for estimating the variograms which is especially favourable for sparse datasets in hydro-geophysics. The computations were done using Ms-Excel to ensure that a desired number of pairs to be taken into consideration for variography.