Global farmers could get better decision-making help as refinements are made to North Alabama soil moisture modeling research being done by an atmospheric science doctoral student at UAH. The models indicate how much added moisture would be needed in a given area versus historical data to achieve various crop yields, and they could aid in making expensive infrastructure investments by helping to determine their economic viability. "The important thing that I want to stress is that this is not a predictive model, it is a decision-support model. It helps farmers and officials make decisions based on historical weather patterns," says doctoral student Vikalp Mishra. In areas where water is in short supply, irrigation infrastructure can be expensive and the model could help to determine its economic cost effectiveness.