Memorias de investigación
Artículos en revistas:
Soil aggregate geometry: Measurements and morphology
Año:2015
Áreas de investigación
  • Física química y matemáticas,
  • Ciencias naturales y ciencias de la salud
Datos
Descripción
Aggregates provide physical microenvironments for microorganisms, the vital actors of soil systems, and thus play a major role as both, an arena and a product of soil carbon stabilization and dynamics. The surface of an aggregate is what enables exchange of the materials and air and water fluxes between aggregate exterior and interior regions. We made use of 3D images from X-ray CT of aggregates and mathematical morphology to provide an exhaustive quantitative description of soil aggregate morphology that includes both intra-aggregate pore space structure and aggregate surface features. First, the evolution of Minkowski functionals (i.e. volume, boundary surface, curvature and connectivity) for successive dilations of the solid part of aggregates was investigated to quantify its 3D geometrical features. Second, the inner pore space was considered as the object of interest. We devised procedures (a) to define the ends of the accessible pores that are connected to the aggregate surface and (b) to separate accessible and inaccessible porosity. Geometrical Minkowski functionals of the intra-aggregate pore space provide the exhaustive characterization of the inner structure of the aggregates. Aggregates collected from two different soil treatments were analyzed to explore the utility of these morphological tools in capturing the impact on their morphology of two different soil managements, i.e. conventional tillage management, and native succession vegetation treatment. The quantitative tools of mathematical morphology distinguished differences in patterns of aggregate structure associated to the different soil managements.
Internacional
Si
JCR del ISI
Si
Título de la revista
Geoderma
ISSN
0016-7061
Factor de impacto JCR
2,345
Información de impacto
Datos JCR del año 2012
Volumen
DOI
Número de revista
Desde la página
36
Hasta la página
48
Mes
ENERO
Ranking
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Participantes
Grupos de investigación, Departamentos, Centros e Institutos de I+D+i relacionados
  • Creador: Grupo de Investigación: Fractales y Aplicaciones en Ciencias del Suelo y Medioambientales (PEDOFRACT)
  • Departamento: Matemática Aplicada