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Abstract Dryland ecosystems cover 40% of our planet's land surface, support billions of people, and are responding rapidly to climate and land use change. These expansive systems also dominate core aspects of Earth's climate, storing and exchanging vast amounts of water, carbon, and energy with the atmosphere. Despite their indispensable ecosystem services and high vulnerability to change, drylands are one of the least understood ecosystem types, partly due to challenges studying their heterogeneous landscapes and misconceptions that drylands are unproductive “wastelands.” Consequently, inadequate understanding of dryland processes has resulted in poor model representation and forecasting capacity, hindering decision making for these at‐risk ecosystems. NASA satellite resources are increasingly available at the higher resolutions needed to enhance understanding of drylands' heterogeneous spatiotemporal dynamics. NASA's Terrestrial Ecology Program solicited proposals for scoping a multi‐year field campaign, of which Adaptation and Response in Drylands (ARID) was one of two scoping studies selected. A primary goal of the scoping study is to gather input from the scientific and data end‐user communities on dryland research gaps and data user needs. Here, we provide an overview of the ARID team's community engagement and how it has guided development of our framework. This includes an ARID kickoff meeting with over 300 participants held in October 2023 at the University of Arizona to gather input from data end‐users and scientists. We also summarize insights gained from hundreds of follow‐up activities, including from a tribal‐engagement focused workshop in New Mexico, conference town halls, intensive roundtables, and international engagements. 

Abstract. The continental tropics play a leading role in the terrestrial energy,water, and carbon cycles. Land–atmosphere interactions are integral in theregulation of these fluxes across multiple spatial and temporal scales overtropical continents. We review here some of the important characteristics oftropical continental climates and how land–atmosphere interactions regulatethem. Along with a wide range of climates, the tropics manifest a diversearray of land–atmosphere interactions. Broadly speaking, in tropicalrainforest climates, light and energy are typically more limiting thanprecipitation and water supply for photosynthesis and evapotranspiration (ET),whereas in savanna and semi-arid climates, water is the critical regulatorof surface fluxes and land–atmosphere interactions. We discuss the impact ofthe land surface, how it affects shallow and deep clouds, and how theseclouds in turn can feed back to the surface by modulating surface radiationand precipitation. Some results from recent research suggest that shallowclouds may be especially critical to land–atmosphere interactions. On theother hand, the impact of land-surface conditions on deep convection appearsto occur over larger, nonlocal scales and may be a more relevantland–atmosphere feedback mechanism in transitional dry-to-wet regions andclimate regimes.