Articles | Volume 11, issue 1
https://doi.org/10.5194/soil-11-67-2025
© Author(s) 2025. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
Special issue:
https://doi.org/10.5194/soil-11-67-2025
© Author(s) 2025. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
Closing the phenotyping gap with non-invasive belowground field phenotyping
Guillaume Blanchy
Plant Science Unit, Flanders Research Institute for Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (ILVO), Melle, Belgium
Urban and Environmental Engineering (UEE), University of Liège (ULiège), Liège, Belgium
Fonds de la Recherche Scientifique – FNRS, Brussels, Belgium
Waldo Deroo
Plant Science Unit, Flanders Research Institute for Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (ILVO), Melle, Belgium
Tom De Swaef
Plant Science Unit, Flanders Research Institute for Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (ILVO), Melle, Belgium
Peter Lootens
Plant Science Unit, Flanders Research Institute for Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (ILVO), Melle, Belgium
Paul Quataert
Plant Science Unit, Flanders Research Institute for Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (ILVO), Melle, Belgium
Isabel Roldán-Ruíz
Plant Science Unit, Flanders Research Institute for Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (ILVO), Melle, Belgium
Roelof Versteeg
Subsurface Insights LLC (SSI), Hanover, USA
Sarah Garré
CORRESPONDING AUTHOR
Plant Science Unit, Flanders Research Institute for Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (ILVO), Melle, Belgium
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Guillaume Blanchy, Lukas Albrecht, John Koestel, and Sarah Garré
SOIL, 9, 155–168, https://doi.org/10.5194/soil-9-155-2023, https://doi.org/10.5194/soil-9-155-2023, 2023
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Adapting agricultural practices to future climatic conditions requires us to synthesize the effects of management practices on soil properties with respect to local soil and climate. We showcase different automated text-processing methods to identify topics, extract metadata for building a database and summarize findings from publication abstracts. While human intervention remains essential, these methods show great potential to support evidence synthesis from large numbers of publications.
Solomon Ehosioke, Sarah Garre, Johan Alexander Huisman, Egon Zimmermann, Mathieu Javaux, and Frederic Nguyen
EGUsphere, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2024-2628, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2024-2628, 2024
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We investigated the electrical properties of the primary roots of Brachypodium and Maize plants during the uptake of fresh and saline water using SIP measurements in a frequency range from 1 Hz to 45 kHz. Our results indicate that salinity tolerance varies with the species, and that Maize is more tolerant to salinity than Brachypodium.
Guillaume Blanchy, Lukas Albrecht, Gilberto Bragato, Sarah Garré, Nicholas Jarvis, and John Koestel
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci., 27, 2703–2724, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-27-2703-2023, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-27-2703-2023, 2023
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We collated the Open Tension-disk Infiltrometer Meta-database (OTIM). We analysed topsoil hydraulic conductivities at supply tensions between 0 and 100 mm of 466 data entries. We found indications of different flow mechanisms at saturation and at tensions >20 mm. Climate factors were better correlated with near-saturated hydraulic conductivities than soil properties. Land use, tillage system, soil compaction and experimenter bias significantly influenced K to a similar degree to soil properties.
Guillaume Blanchy, Lukas Albrecht, John Koestel, and Sarah Garré
SOIL, 9, 155–168, https://doi.org/10.5194/soil-9-155-2023, https://doi.org/10.5194/soil-9-155-2023, 2023
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Adapting agricultural practices to future climatic conditions requires us to synthesize the effects of management practices on soil properties with respect to local soil and climate. We showcase different automated text-processing methods to identify topics, extract metadata for building a database and summarize findings from publication abstracts. While human intervention remains essential, these methods show great potential to support evidence synthesis from large numbers of publications.
Guillaume Blanchy, Gilberto Bragato, Claudia Di Bene, Nicholas Jarvis, Mats Larsbo, Katharina Meurer, and Sarah Garré
SOIL, 9, 1–20, https://doi.org/10.5194/soil-9-1-2023, https://doi.org/10.5194/soil-9-1-2023, 2023
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European agriculture is vulnerable to weather extremes. Nevertheless, by choosing well how to manage their land, farmers can protect themselves against drought and peak rains. More than a thousand observations across Europe show that it is important to keep the soil covered with living plants, even in winter. A focus on a general reduction of traffic on agricultural land is more important than reducing tillage. Organic material needs to remain or be added on the field as much as possible.
Sathyanarayan Rao, Félicien Meunier, Solomon Ehosioke, Nolwenn Lesparre, Andreas Kemna, Frédéric Nguyen, Sarah Garré, and Mathieu Javaux
Biogeosciences Discuss., https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-2018-280, https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-2018-280, 2018
Revised manuscript not accepted
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This paper illustrates the impact of electrical property of maize root segments on the Electrical Resistivity Tomography (ERT) inversion results with the help of numerical model. The model includes explicit root representation in the finite element mesh with root growth, transpiration and root water uptake. We show that, ignoring root segments could lead to wrong estimation of water content using ERT method.
Gaël Dumont, Tamara Pilawski, Thomas Hermans, Frédéric Nguyen, and Sarah Garré
Hydrol. Earth Syst. Sci. Discuss., https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-2018-163, https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-2018-163, 2018
Preprint withdrawn
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We used long time lapse geoelectrical profiles to monitor water infiltration through a landfill cover layer. The obtained electrical resistivity changes are smoothed and reflect both moisture variations, the background resistivity heterogeneity, and temperature and salinity changes due to water infiltration. Interpretation limits were investigated by using synthetic modelling. Using these results to avoid over-interpretation, field observations revealed zones where large infiltration occurs.
Eléonore Beckers, Mathieu Pichault, Wanwisa Pansak, Aurore Degré, and Sarah Garré
SOIL, 2, 421–431, https://doi.org/10.5194/soil-2-421-2016, https://doi.org/10.5194/soil-2-421-2016, 2016
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Determining the behaviour of stony soils with respect to infiltration and storage of water is of major importance, since stony soils are widespread across the globe. The most common procedure to overcome this difficulty is to describe the hydraulic characteristics of a stony soils in terms of the fine fraction of soil corrected for the volume of stones present. Our study suggests that considering this hypothesis might be ill-founded, especially for saturated soils.
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Uncovering soil compaction: performance of electrical and electromagnetic geophysical methods
Assessing soil fertilization effects using time-lapse electromagnetic induction
The effect of soil moisture content and soil texture on fast in situ pH measurements with two types of robust ion-selective electrodes
Best performances of visible–near-infrared models in soils with little carbonate – a field study in Switzerland
Delineating the distribution of mineral and peat soils at the landscape scale in northern boreal regions
Improving models to predict holocellulose and Klason lignin contents for peat soil organic matter with mid-infrared spectra
Alberto Carrera, Luca Peruzzo, Matteo Longo, Giorgio Cassiani, and Francesco Morari
SOIL, 10, 843–857, https://doi.org/10.5194/soil-10-843-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/soil-10-843-2024, 2024
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Soil compaction resulting from inappropriate agricultural practices affects soil ecological functions, decreasing the water-use efficiency of plants. Recent developments contributed to innovative sensing approaches aimed at safeguarding soil health. Here, we explored how the most used geophysical methods detect soil compaction. Results, validated with traditional characterization methods, show the pros and cons of non-invasive techniques and their ability to characterize compacted areas.
Manuela S. Kaufmann, Anja Klotzsche, Jan van der Kruk, Anke Langen, Harry Vereecken, and Lutz Weihermüller
EGUsphere, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2024-2889, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2024-2889, 2024
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To use fertilizers more effectively, non-invasive geophysical methods can be used to understand nutrient distribution in the soil. We utilize in a long-term field study geophysical techniques to study soil properties and conditions under different fertilizer treatments. We compared the geophysical responds with soil samples and soil sensor data. Especially, electromagnetic induction and electrical resistivity tomography were effective in monitoring changes in nitrate levels over time.
Sebastian Vogel, Katja Emmerich, Ingmar Schröter, Eric Bönecke, Wolfgang Schwanghart, Jörg Rühlmann, Eckart Kramer, and Robin Gebbers
SOIL, 10, 321–333, https://doi.org/10.5194/soil-10-321-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/soil-10-321-2024, 2024
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To rapidly obtain high-resolution soil pH data, pH sensors can measure the pH value directly in the field under the current soil moisture (SM) conditions. The influence of SM on pH and on its measurement quality was studied. An SM increase causes a maximum pH increase of 1.5 units. With increasing SM, the sensor pH value approached the standard pH value measured in the laboratory. Thus, at high soil moisture, calibration of the sensor pH values to the standard pH value is negligible.
Simon Oberholzer, Laura Summerauer, Markus Steffens, and Chinwe Ifejika Speranza
SOIL, 10, 231–249, https://doi.org/10.5194/soil-10-231-2024, https://doi.org/10.5194/soil-10-231-2024, 2024
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This study investigated the performance of visual and near-infrared spectroscopy in six fields in Switzerland. Spectral models showed a good performance for soil properties related to organic matter at the field scale. However, spectral models performed best in fields with low mean carbonate content because high carbonate content masks spectral features for organic carbon. These findings help facilitate the establishment and implementation of new local soil spectroscopy projects.
Anneli M. Ågren, Eliza Maher Hasselquist, Johan Stendahl, Mats B. Nilsson, and Siddhartho S. Paul
SOIL, 8, 733–749, https://doi.org/10.5194/soil-8-733-2022, https://doi.org/10.5194/soil-8-733-2022, 2022
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Historically, many peatlands in the boreal region have been drained for timber production. Given the prospects of a drier future due to climate change, wetland restorations are now increasing. Better maps hold the key to insights into restoration targets and land-use management policies, and maps are often the number one decision-support tool. We use an AI-developed soil moisture map based on laser scanning data to illustrate how the mapping of peatlands can be improved across an entire nation.
Henning Teickner and Klaus-Holger Knorr
SOIL, 8, 699–715, https://doi.org/10.5194/soil-8-699-2022, https://doi.org/10.5194/soil-8-699-2022, 2022
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The chemical quality of biomass can be described with holocellulose (relatively easily decomposable by microorganisms) and Klason lignin (relatively recalcitrant) contents. Measuring both is laborious. In a recent study, models have been proposed which can predict both quicker from mid-infrared spectra. However, it has not been analyzed if these models make correct predictions for biomass in soils and how to improve them. We provide such a validation and a strategy for their improvement.
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Short summary
This work implemented automated electrical resistivity tomography (ERT) for belowground field phenotyping alongside conventional field breeding techniques, thereby closing the phenotyping gap. We show that ERT is not only capable of measuring differences between crops but also has sufficient precision to capture the differences between genotypes of the same crop. We automatically derive indicators, which can be translated to static and dynamic plant traits, directly useful for breeders.
This work implemented automated electrical resistivity tomography (ERT) for belowground field...
Special issue