Soil functions
биогеоценотических функциях почв. — Вестн. Моск. ун-та
Сер. Почвоведение. 1977, № 4. pp.3-8.</ref>[1][2][3]Cite error: A <ref> tag is missing the closing </ref> (see the help page). The understanding of soil formation process can help define certain type of soil and reflect the composition of soil minerals. However, the natural area of productive soils is limited and due to increasing pressure of cropping, forestry, and urbanization, extracting soil as a raw material needs to be controlled for.
Physical and cultural heritage
Soil also has more general culture functions as they act as a part of the cultural landscape of our minds as well as the physical world around us.[4] An attachment to home soils or a sense of place is a cultural attribute developed mores strongly in certain people. Soils has been around since the creation of earth, it can act as a factor in determining how humans have migrated in the past.[4] Soil also act as an earth cover that protects and preserve the physical artifacts of the past that can allow us to better understand cultural heritage. Moreover, soil has been an important indication to where people settle as they are an essential resource for human productivity.
Platform for man-made structures
Soil can act as raw material deposits and is widely used in building materials. Approximately 50% of the people on the planet live in houses that are constructed from soil.[5] The conditions of the soil must be firm and solid to provide a good base for roads and highways to be built on. Additionally, since these structures rest on the soil, factors such as its bearing strength, compressibility, stability, and shear strength al need to be considered.[5] Testing the physical properties allow a better application to engineering uses of soil.
Mapping soil functions
Soil mapping is the identification, description, ad delineation on a map of different types of soil based on direct field observations or on indirect inferences from souch sources such as aerial photographs.[6] Soil maps can depict soil properties and functions in the context of specific soil functions such as agricultural food production, environmental protection, and civil engineering considerations. Maps can depict functional interpretations of specific properties such as critical nutrient levels, heavy-metal levels or can depict interpretation of multiple properties such as a map of erosion risk index.
Mapping of function specific soil properties is an extension of soil survey, using maps of soil components together with auxiliary information (including pedotransfer functions and soil inference models) to depict inferences about the specific performance of soil mapping units. Other functions of soil in ecosystems:
- source of building materials (clay, sand, rocks)
- carbon recycler
- fiber production
See also
References
- ^ Nikin, E. D. (1982). The role of soils in the life of nature (in Russian). Znanie, Moscow. p. 47.
- ^ Dobrovolsky, G. V.; Nikitin, E. D. (1986). Ecological functions of the soil (in Russian). MSU, Moscow. p. 260.
- ^ Dobrovolsky, G. V.; Nikitin, E. D. (1990). Soil functions in the biosphere and ecosystems (in Russian). Nauka, Moscow. p. 260.
- ^ a b Cite error: The named reference
:2was invoked but never defined (see the help page). - ^ a b Brady, Nyle C. The nature and properties of soils. ISBN 9781292162249. OCLC 965387174.
- ^ Mapping Systems Working Group. 198%. A Soil Mapping System for Canada: revised. Land Resource Research Institute, Contribution No. 142, Agriculture Canada, Ottawa, 94 pp.
