Investigating spatiotemporal monitoring of soil organic matter using spectral induced polarization
EMSL Project ID
60683
Abstract
Understanding soil organic matter (SOM) dynamic behavior and interactions is critical in determining regional soil fertility and health. SOM controls crop yields, the diversity of microorganisms used to degrade organic pollutants, pesticide sorption, and organo-mineral complexation which has been linked to carbon stabilization potential in bioactive environments. Field scale methods to study the dynamic spatiotemporal behavior of SOM are limited to collecting field samples and performing laboratory analyses; however, this is labor intensive, particularly when looking at changes over time and also may not capture the effects of soil heterogeneities. Only a few studies have evaluated the geophysical method, spectral induced polarization (SIP) as a non-invasive monitoring alternative. These preliminary studies are promising and show that OM increases the SIP response however, it is postulated that as organo-mineral complexes form, ionic mobility decreases in tandem with the SIP signal. The objective of this proposal is to evaluate SIP as a tool for understanding SOM biogeochemical behavior. Using a staged approach, we propose to 1) evaluate the sensitivity of SIP changes in organo-mineral complexation in microfluidic experiments 2) evaluate this SIP response using relaxation and mechanistic models 3) incorporate this understanding within pore network SIP modeling and 4) move to more complex controlled experiments in laboratory columns with physical and chemical heterogeneity, evaluating proposed models.
Project Details
Start Date
2023-01-26
End Date
2023-10-01
Status
Closed
Released Data Link
Team
Principal Investigator
Co-Investigator(s)
Team Members