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Soil sealing or soil surface sealing is the loss of soil resources due to the covering of land for housing, roads or other construction work. [1] Covering or replacing the topsoil with impervious materials like asphalt and cement as a result of urban development and infrastructure construction paired with compaction of the underlying soil layers results in the mostly irreversible loss of ...
The dry matter consists mainly of carbon, oxygen, and hydrogen. Although these three elements make up about 92% of the dry weight of the organic matter in the soil, other elements present are essential for the nutrition of plants, including nitrogen, phosphorus, potassium, sulfur, calcium, magnesium, and many micronutrients. [1]
The soil forming process (pedogenesis) can begin without the aid of biology but is significantly quickened in the presence of biologic reactions, where it forms a soil carbon sponge. [2] Soil formation begins with the chemical and/or physical breakdown of minerals to form the initial material that overlies the bedrock substrate.
At the next larger scale, soil structures called peds or more commonly soil aggregates are created from the soil separates when iron oxides, carbonates, clay, silica and humus, coat particles and cause them to adhere into larger, relatively stable secondary structures. [2] Soil bulk density, when determined at standardized moisture conditions ...
Soil, also commonly referred to as earth, is a mixture of organic matter, minerals, gases, liquids, and organisms that together support the life of plants and soil organisms. Some scientific definitions distinguish dirt from soil by restricting the former term specifically to displaced soil. Soil measuring and surveying device
Soil formation, also known as pedogenesis, is the process of soil genesis as regulated by the effects of place, environment, and history. Biogeochemical processes act to both create and destroy order within soils.
Soil biology is the study of microbial and faunal activity and ecology in soil. Soil life, soil biota, soil fauna, or edaphon is a collective term that encompasses all organisms that spend a significant portion of their life cycle within a soil profile, or at the soil-litter interface.
Soil is made up of a multitude of physical, chemical, and biological entities, with many interactions occurring among them. It is a heterogenous mixture of minerals and organic matter with variations in moisture, temperature and nutrients.