The semi-arid region, as a key part of global land, plays an important role in climate change. In the process of modern climate change, the semi-arid region is significantly affected by local human activities, showing remarkable expansion and obvious decadal variations. In this paper, we summarized the studies of the land-atmosphere interaction in the semi-arid regions in recent years, and major land surface observation plans. We put emphasis on energy balance, water cycle, carbon cycle in land-atmosphere interaction of climate change, and their performance in historical simulation and future prediction. The prediction results illustrate that new character of land-atmosphere interaction will appear as the drying of drylands in the future. Therefore, it is necessary to deepen the understanding of land-atmosphere interaction and move forward energetically on research in regional climate from different aspects.