LPJ-GUESS-Cryo: Improved Permafrost Soil and Hydrothermal Representation for Boreal Forest Carbon Dynamics

LPJ-GUESS-Cryo is an extended version of the dynamic global vegetation model LPJ-GUESS, developed to improve the representation of permafrost soil processes and freeze–thaw-driven hydrology in boreal forest ecosystems. This release introduces a vertically resolved soil column and enhanced freeze–thaw hydrology, including a continuous hydraulic impedance formulation, a delayed infiltration scheme for rain and snowmelt, impedance-limited cascading percolation between soil layers, and vertically resolved daily soil temperature and soil water content diagnostics. The model is designed to improve simulations of soil hydrothermal dynamics, active layer processes, and their impacts on vegetation composition, ecosystem structure, and carbon cycling in permafrost-affected regions. This release corresponds to the model version used in the study: Improving Permafrost Soil Representation in a Dynamic Global Vegetation Model Enhances Predictions of Boreal Forest Carbon Dynamics and Vegetation Structure. LPJ-GUESS version 4.1 serves as the baseline for this extension. All general information about LPJ-GUESS can be found at:https://web.nateko.lu.se/lpj-guess/ Unless specifically aiming to reproduce the results presented in the study above, users are encouraged to consult the latest official release of LPJ-GUESS, which includes recent developments and bug fixes. For details on how this archived version relates to the current official release and for community updates, please refer to the LPJ-GUESS website.