Frontiers in Soil Science Research Report of a Workshop (2009) / Chapter Skim
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4 The Frontiers in Soil Science Research
4 The Frontiers in Soil Science Research
Pages 31-44
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From page 31... ...
Overarching Challenges Throughout the workshop, two main challenges were frequently mentioned. One was the need to place a value on the soil resource and give the soil science discipline societal relevance by relating it to global issues such as food and energy security, human health, and environmental sustainability.
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From page 32... ...
At the other end of the spectrum, César Izaurralde and others noted that some landscape processes occur over geologic scales beyond human perception. Scaling up of processes, rather than simply scaling up of properties, by soil scientists is particularly understudied, and soil scientists are often uncomfortable in doing so, as noted by one of the breakout groups.
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From page 33... ...
Ecosystem functioning research needs: • Identify and quantify key ecosystem services provided by soil • Measure the value of ecosystem services performed by soil • Develop measurements to extrapolate to the ecosystem scale • Develop appropriate indicators of soil function • Long-term monitoring to quantify global dynamics • Incorporate soils into studies of urban ecosystems Role of Soils in Human Health There is a general need to characterize the relationship between soil quality and human health, including processes at the landscape scale. For example, the relationship between the transport of biologicals and their fate in soil and human health issues needs to be explored.
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From page 34... ...
Human health research needs: • Characterize the relationship between soil quality and hu man health • Relate virus transport and fate in soil to human health • Characterize the effect of soil particulates from desertifica tion on human health • Characterize the role of soil quality in water quality and its effect on human health Transport Processes To better interface within the soil science community and with other sciences, it is important to understand transport processes in soil and to scale up to global processes. For example: (1)
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From page 35... ...
The biofilm-microbe surface interaction and biotic interaction at surfaces relates to geochemical cycling processes, not just to nutrient cycling. It was noted that the plant-soil interface relates to soil formation, that is, the role of interfaces in controlling rates of weathering.
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From page 36... ...
There is also a need to characterize the reaction of soil to external perturbations from climate, as well as the long-term stability and resilience of soil experiencing degradation from human activity. Coupled reaction processes research needs: • Employ in situ imaging techniques • Understand dynamic reactive phases • Improve characterization of the dynamics and coupling between physical, chemical, and biological processes • Improve the understanding of feedback mechanisms be tween physical, chemical, and biological processes
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From page 37... ...
, and imaging techniques is needed to elucidate soil processes. James Tiedje suggested expanding omics studies on important soil bacteria to discern and investigate genes relevant to soil ecology.
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From page 38... ...
The development����������������������������������������������������������� and use of nondestructive imaging methods to characterize three-dimensional soil structures of nondisturbed soil horizons, and the development of dynamic flow theory that transforms three-dimensional soil architecture into function is a frontier research area. ������������������������� Such spatial informatics can be applied at multiple scales.
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From page 39... ...
The development of computational methodologies could help address complexity problems such as heterogeneity, variability, and scaling, as noted in Session 3. Furthermore, new techniques characterizing mineral surfaces could contribute to understanding microbial interactions with charged surfaces and help create bridges between soil chemistry and soil biology.
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From page 40... ...
Furthermore, the revolution in molecular biology and the fusion and integration of rapidly advancing analytical and molecular biological methods are enabling key biogeochemical processes to be probed at very high resolution at submicron to millimeter scales. The integration of this physical, chemical, and biological information collected in situ with these advanced techniques will provide an unprecedented opportunity to understand how physicochemical and biological processes are coupled and to elucidate various feedbacks that are operating in complex environmental systems.
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From page 41... ...
������������������������������������ . The group has expertise in a wide variety of fields: experimental soil mechanics, mycology, cell biology, computational fluid mechanics, statistical mechanics, theoretical biology, plant physiology, computer gaming, and information technology.
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From page 42... ...
While many in the soil science community have been involved in the planning and execution of these major interdisciplinary research initiatives, more soil scientists have to become involved to ensure that the role of soil is properly appreciated up front and that appropriate measurements of soil properties and processes are integrated into the observatory and experimental platforms. Several presenters and participants noted that there are major challenges in scaling up from understanding mechanisms involved in coupled hydrobiogeochemical processes in soil that control the fate and transport of water, nutrients, carbon, contaminants, and pathogens to addressing issues manifested at larger scales.
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From page 43... ...
To address these larger-scale issues and to properly integrate advances and breakthroughs in soil science research into policy will require collaborations with colleagues in the social sciences, humanities, and economics. Jayne Belnap, in discussing the final presentation, stressed how soil scientists must collaborate with others to make them aware of the importance of soils.
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From page 44... ...
Soil scientists are not being extensively involved in much of this work, and the work may be suffering by not having greater involvement by soil scientists. There is voluntary certification for soil scientists, and some states have licensing of soil scientists, but this is not widespread.
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