The concept of root contact hypothesizes that the absorbing roots grown in sandy soil are only partially effective in water uptake. Co-ordination of water supply and demand in the plant requires that the capacity for water uptake from the soil should correspond to an operational rate of water loss from the leaves. To examine how the plant hydraulic system responds to variations in soil texture ...

The multilingual soil profile database (named SDBm Plus) is user-friendly software designed to store and retrieve in an efficient and systematic way the large amounts of geo-referenced soil attribute data collected in soil surveys and laboratories. The database has the following main characteristics: (i) running on Windows platforms; (ii) ‘assist menus’ facilitating data entry; (iii) automatic ...

Knowledge of hydraulic properties, such as hydraulic conductivity and soil moisture retention, is crucial for understanding flow and contaminant transport in the subsurface. Hydraulic properties are often important input parameters for numerical simulation of flow and transport. Unfortunately, acquisition of these properties is usually time consuming and costly because of the manual labor assoc...

The desiccation of upper soil horizons is a common phenomenon, leading to a decrease in soil microbial activity and mineralization. Recent studies have shown that fungal communities and fungal-based food webs are less sensitive and better adapted to soil desiccation than bacterial-based food webs. One reason for a better fungal adaptation to soil desiccation may be hydraulic redistribution of w...

als, high pH, and low sesquioxides content was found to be susceptible to sodic conditions, with the magnitude Combined effects of soil conditions (wetting rate), soil sodicity, of the decrease in HC being strongly dependent on the and salinity on soil saturated hydraulic conductivity (HC) have not been studied systematically and were the objective of our study. We electrolyte concentration in ...

The Wells G and H Superfund site, located in the Aberjona watershed in Woburn, Massachusetts, has been studied by a number of MIT research groups since 1987. Initial research conducted to characterize the hydraulic properties of the wetland deposits, did not indicate the classical trend linking changes in hydraulic conductivity to changes in total porosity. It was hypothesized, therefore, that ...

Nowadays, applying soil amendments is one of the most important ways to cope with water shortages and improve soil physical properties. In this regard, a greenhouse experiment was conducted to study the effect of different levels of irrigation water and wheat straw biochar on physical and chemical properties of a sandy loam soil, after harvesting faba bean. The experiment was performed with 5 b...

The aim of this study was to investigate the effects of biochar amendment on soil aggregate formation and stability, and soil hydraulic properties. Biochar produced from dairy manure was added to two different soils (a silty clay and a sandy loam soil) at a ratio of 2% (w/w in dry weight basis). Incubation experiments were conducted within a 90-d period with the soils (the controls) and the soi...