Geomorphic and land cover assessment of dust sources affecting the west and North-West Iran

 The most important environmental challenges facing the West of iran in recent years is the dust phenomenon, that today has become one of the most important problems in arid and semi-arid areas. This phenomenon occurs as a climatic phenomenon in all climatic conditions, that causes adverse social, economic, environmental and commercial impacts. In this research have used dust sources that have  been identified  by Jalali and Davoodi (2008) for study effects of surface features on the creation of dust sources on the west of the country. The study area is ​​about 1200,000 square kilometers that located in the east of middle east includes Iraq and parts of Iran, Turkey, Syria, Jordan, Saudi Arabia and Kuwait. The aim of  this research is to evaluate geomorphic characteristics and surface sediments, land cover, and wind erosion potential of dust sources in the study area. For this purpose, on based on the Bullard (2011) classification, first, layers of geomorphic , soil and land cover class were prepared and classified to three groups low, medium and high, according to the relative importance of the classes in the release of dusts. Subsequently, using 40 data stations, wind erosion potential (EW) was calculated and zoned by Kriging method. The results showed that geomorphic characteristics have the greatest role in the distribution of emission control factors. Sand dunes in the geomorphic classes with a dust Emission Ratio of 35.3 unit have the greatest effect on the creation of dust sources. There is not much conformity between different classes of land cover and type of soil with dust sources, but there is compatibility between the wind erosion potential with dust sources and the most dust sources  created in areas with high wind erosion potential.