European Journal of Soil Science最新文献

{"title":"Multi‐Scale Hydro‐Geochemical Processes Regulating Soil Alkalinity: Evidence From Lake–Land Interactions","authors":"Yining Zhou, Jing Wang, Xueqiu Wang, Chan Chang, Xuewei Wang, Guoqiang Qiu, Qingqing Liu, Mi Tian","doi":"10.1111/ejss.70431","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1111/ejss.70431","url":null,"abstract":"Soil pH is a key factor influencing ecological security and sustainable agricultural development and serves as a major indicator of soil alkalization. Although the general ‘acidic in the southeast and alkaline in the northwest’ pattern is well documented in China, the spatial organization of regional alkaline hotspots and the relative contributions of climatic, lithological and hydro‐geochemical controls across the continental scale have not been systematically quantified. This study developed a random forest model based on 3382 national floodplain soil samples and 20 socio‐environmental factors to identify the dominant predictors on soil alkalinity. Model interpretation was further supported by SHapley Additive exPlanations (SHAP) analysis and spatial analysis. The results show that calcium oxide is the most important predictor of alkalinity, followed by mean annual precipitation and nitrogen content. Alkaline hotspots are concentrated in the central Qinghai–Tibet Plateau, central and eastern Inner Mongolia and western Jilin Province, showing strong spatial association with lakes larger than 1 km <jats:sup>2</jats:sup> . Soil pH decreases systematically with distance from lakeshores (0.3–1.0 units within 150 km), providing nationwide quantitative evidence that lake systems amplify localized alkaline hotspots across contrasting environmental regions. Through case studies and geographical zoning, dominant alkalization mechanisms were identified and region‐specific ecological management and land‐use strategies are proposed. These findings deepen the understanding of multiscale drivers of soil alkalization and support salinization control and ecological restoration in arid and semi‐arid regions of China.","PeriodicalId":12043,"journal":{"name":"European Journal of Soil Science","volume":"12 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":4.2,"publicationDate":"2026-10-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"149086867","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"农林科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Duration Is Not Age: A Thermodynamic Framework for Pedogenetic Time","authors":"Bruno M. Chávez-Vergara","doi":"10.1111/ejss.70430","DOIUrl":"10.1111/ejss.70430","url":null,"abstract":"<div>\u0000 \u0000 <p>The concept of time in pedology has been operationalized almost exclusively as chronological or radiometric age, following Jenny's (1941) state factor formalism, which treats the soil as a passive recorder of elapsed time rather than as an active archive of energetic history. I argue that this conflates two different quantities: elapsed time and the capacity of that interval to drive pedogenic processes. I propose that pedogenetic time (T_ped) is more rigorously defined as the integral of effective energy coupled to edaphic processes, ∫ E_ex(τ) dτ, where coupling efficiency η(τ) ∈ [0,1] captures the fraction of gross energy input directed toward pedogenic reactions rather than dissipated. T_ped constitutes a formal mechanism of soil memory: current pedogenic state depends not on calendar age alone but on the entire path by which effective energy has accumulated, a fundamentally hysteretic relationship in which identical present conditions can sustain different trajectories depending on prior energetic history. This path-dependency introduces property-specific thermodynamic thresholds (Θ_P) governing the emergence of soil properties, and defines energetic retrogression, the collapse of η(τ) under degradation or climate stress, as pedogenetic memory loss. Two contrasting cases anchor the argument: arid chronosequences exhibiting chronic pedogenic youth despite large calendar age, and technogenic soils showing premature pedogenic ageing through managed high-efficiency inputs. Independent convergence with biological ageing theory, JMAK phase-transition kinetics, geomorphological energy balance, and non-equilibrium thermodynamics supports the framework, which aligns with recent global evidence that energy limitation, not carbon availability, governs soil microbial activity. Chronological age measures the duration of pedogenesis; T_ped measures its depth, with direct consequences for chronosequence interpretation, climate-change modelling and Critical Zone restoration.</p>\u0000 </div>","PeriodicalId":12043,"journal":{"name":"European Journal of Soil Science","volume":"77 5","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":4.3,"publicationDate":"2026-10-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"149086866","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"农林科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Soil Profile Effects on Bacterial Diversity and Assembly Under Rotation–Tillage Management on China's Loess Plateau","authors":"Xidan Cao,&nbsp;Xiaoyan Gu,&nbsp;Huihui Hu,&nbsp;Jianke Xiao,&nbsp;Yi Liu,&nbsp;Vinay Nangia,&nbsp;Yang Liu","doi":"10.1111/ejss.70428","DOIUrl":"10.1111/ejss.70428","url":null,"abstract":"<div>\u0000 \u0000 <p>Bacteria are ubiquitous in soil and play an important role in biogeochemical processes. However, most studies on soil bacterial communities have focused on the upper soil layer (0–0 cm), and relatively few studies have focused on deep soil bacterial communities, especially in agroecosystems. This study investigated soil bacterial communities across a 0–100 cm profile (five layers) under crop rotations (maize-wheat vs. soybean-wheat) and tillage practices (chisel vs. plow tillage) in semiarid Loess Plateau farmlands using high-throughput sequencing. Soil depth exerted stronger control over bacterial communities than agricultural management. Soil bacterial community α-diversity showed a unimodal trend across the soil profile, with the Shannon index peaking at 20–40 cm and the Chao1 index at 40–60 cm, and this pattern was consistent across different management practices. The relative abundances of Proteobacteria, Actinobacteria, and Bacteroidetes were higher in the upper soil layer, while the relative abundances of Acidobacteria, Gemmatimonadetes, Chloroflexi, and Nitrospirae were higher in the deeper soil layers. Both soybean-wheat pattern and chisel plow tillage practice reduced the complexities of soil bacterial community co-occurrence patterns, while the complexities of community co-occurrence patterns showed a unimodal trend throughout the soil profile, with the highest complexity observed at the 60–80 cm layer. Additionally, the soybean-wheat pattern and chisel plow tillage practice decreased the contribution of deterministic process to soil bacterial community assembly, while the contribution of deterministic process increased with soil depth. Meanwhile, soil physicochemical properties were closely related to the diversity and assembly processes of bacterial communities. Our study reveals bacterial community diversity dynamics and assembly drivers across soil profiles in semiarid farmlands.</p>\u0000 </div>","PeriodicalId":12043,"journal":{"name":"European Journal of Soil Science","volume":"77 5","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":4.3,"publicationDate":"2026-09-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"149083850","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"农林科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Tillage Legacy Modulates Soil Mechanical Sensitivity, Root System, and Wheat Grain Yield Under Short-Term Compaction","authors":"Ameet Kumar,&nbsp;Wenxu Dong,&nbsp;Xiuwei Liu,&nbsp;Chunsheng Hu","doi":"10.1111/ejss.70427","DOIUrl":"10.1111/ejss.70427","url":null,"abstract":"<div>\u0000 \u0000 <p>Long-term conservation tillage improves soil condition, but episodic wheel traffic may impose mechanical constraints that alter root function and reduce yield. How tillage legacy regulates compaction sensitivity and root compensation remains unclear. From 2023 to 2025, on a 22-year tillage platform, we compared moldboard ploughing with residue incorporation (MC) and no-tillage with residue retention (NC), each subjected to short-term compaction (STC) (CMC and CNC). We assessed the soil quality index (SQI; integrating 10 physical (soil bulk density, porosity, penetration resistance, soil moisture content), chemical (available N, P, K, soil organic carbon), and biological (microbial biomass carbon, dissolved organic carbon) indicators in the 0–20 cm layer), root traits (length density, RLD, root weight density, RWD, root surface area, root diameter, RD, and root volume) and trait-specific root fraction at two soil depths (0–20 cm and 20–40 cm), and grain yield across two consecutive growing seasons (2023–2024 and 2024–2025) following a single compaction event. Compaction reduced SQI under both tillage systems. In the immediate season (2024), the decline was greater under MC (42%) than NC (27%); however, the residual-season effect (2025) was more persistent under NC (45%) than MC (40%), reflecting the stronger legacy vulnerability of the no-tillage system. SQI loss was driven mainly by increased soil bulk density and soil penetration resistance and reduced soil moisture, carbon fractions, and nutrient availability. Compaction suppressed shallow-root proliferation (RLD decline: CNC −35%, CMC −18% vs. non-compacted controls in 2024) and, particularly under CNC, increased root fraction allocation to deeper layers across most root traits; however, 60%–90% of roots remained in the 0–20 cm layer across all treatments, and under the non-water-limited conditions of this experiment, deeper rooting did not compensate for topsoil impairment. Grain yield was reduced by 18.4% under CNC and 9.7% under CMC in 2024, with persistent reductions of 15.1% and 7.3%, respectively, in 2025 (all <i>p</i> &lt; 0.05). Topsoil SQI was the strongest predictor of shallow-root development (standardized path coefficient β = 0.79–0.92, <i>p</i> &lt; 0.001; where β represents the change in root traits per standard-deviation change in SQI), and shallow-root traits exerted dominant positive effects on yield (β = 0.67–0.74, <i>p</i> &lt; 0.001), explaining 70%–94% of yield variation, whereas deep-root pathways were non-significant. Yield stability under STC was governed by preservation of topsoil quality and shallow-root functioning. NC exhibited greater mechanical vulnerability to episodic traffic-induced degradation.</p>\u0000 </div>","PeriodicalId":12043,"journal":{"name":"European Journal of Soil Science","volume":"77 5","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":4.3,"publicationDate":"2026-09-27","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"149070961","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"农林科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Deficit Irrigation Trades Shallow for Deep Water Uptake in Saline Cotton, up to a Salinity Limit","authors":"Changkun Ma, Zhen Shen, Qiuping Fu, Quanjiu Wang, Yan Xu, Mingjiang Deng","doi":"10.1111/ejss.70425","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1111/ejss.70425","url":null,"abstract":"Plant‐available water, bounded by the matric contents between field capacity and the wilting point, assumes that all water in the rooting zone is equally usable. Under mulched drip irrigation on saline soil this fails: the emitter creates a desalinated wetting bulb in which roots concentrate, while water outside the bulb remains available yet poorly accessible because extracting it carries an osmotic cost. Whether irrigation can be managed to enlarge the accessed fraction is unknown. Over two seasons (2024–2025) in a saline oasis field at Wensu, southern Xinjiang, we grew film‐mulched drip‐irrigated cotton under four sustained regulated deficit irrigation levels (100%, 85%, 70% and 55% of the full drip‐irrigation quota), combining two‐dimensional water–salinity–potential monitoring, δ <jats:sup>2</jats:sup> H and δ <jats:sup>18</jats:sup> O source partitioning with a depth‐controlled <jats:sup>2</jats:sup> H‐labelling test, minirhizotron root tracking, and coupled root‐zone water and salt balances. Moderate deficit (70%) shifted uptake from the shallow bulb (0–40 cm: 72% → 45% of uptake) towards deeper layers, increased rooting depth (D <jats:sub>95</jats:sub> 62 → 91 cm), and raised deep‐source accessed water—the seasonal transpiration sourced from below the ≈40 cm base of the shallow desalinated bulb—from 115 mm (95% credible interval 106–124) to 193 mm (178–208) while attaining the highest water‐use efficiency (13.1 kg ha <jats:sup>−1</jats:sup> mm <jats:sup>−1</jats:sup> ); minirhizotron imaging showed these deep roots grew actively, not passively stranded. Severe deficit (55%) collapsed the salt export ratio (0.31 → 0.11), re‐concentrating retained salt above the cotton tolerance threshold; deep‐root growth reversed, yield fell 27%, and deep‐source accessed water did not rise further (186 mm, 171–201), its interval overlapping that of the 70% treatment. Saturated conductivity fell only 25%, indicating a predominantly osmotic rather than structural limitation, although a residual structural contribution cannot be excluded. A moderate (≈70%) deficit, bounded by salt re‐concentration, optimised water productivity—field evidence for an accessibility‐based reading of regulated deficit irrigation in saline, mulched‐drip cotton.","PeriodicalId":12043,"journal":{"name":"European Journal of Soil Science","volume":"101 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":4.2,"publicationDate":"2026-09-25","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"149033094","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"农林科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Temperature Sensitivity of Soil Organic Carbon Decomposition During Alpine Mine Slopes Restoration","authors":"Peng Wang, Qinqing Yang, Shenghao Ai, Yifan Leng, Meihua Sheng, Xiaoyan Ai, Yingwei Ai","doi":"10.1111/ejss.70424","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1111/ejss.70424","url":null,"abstract":"Temperature sensitivity (Q <jats:sub>10</jats:sub> ) of soil organic carbon (SOC) decomposition is a key metric for assessing land‐climate carbon (C) feedbacks. However, knowledge of Q <jats:sub>10</jats:sub> during slope ecological restoration remains limited, particularly in alpine mine areas that are highly sensitive to climate change, constraining accurate predictions of slope C‐climate feedbacks. Here, we investigated Q <jats:sub>10</jats:sub> variation and its drivers across five representative mine slopes on the Qinghai‐Tibet Plateau through laboratory incubation experiments. We found that Q <jats:sub>10</jats:sub> values were slightly higher than those reported for other ecosystems on the Tibetan Plateau, with the highest altitude sites exhibiting the greatest temperature sensitivity. Metagenomic analyses showed that microbial functional profiles shifted from greater lignin‐oxidation potential at low altitudes to higher abundances of hydrolytic genes at high altitudes. In addition, the abundance of genes involved in the degradation of starch, hemicellulose, cellulose, and chitin increased with altitude and exhibited the strongest positive correlations with DOC (dissolved organic carbon). Microbial biomass carbon (MBC) was identified as the strongest predictor of Q <jats:sub>10</jats:sub> variation in alpine mine slopes. Overall, our results suggest that altitude‐related variation in Q <jats:sub>10</jats:sub> was associated with DOC and MBC. Collectively, these findings underscore the importance of substrate availability and microbial biomass in shaping soil C‐climate feedback strength in alpine slope ecosystems and provide a scientific foundation for improving soil C stability and management in alpine mine slope restoration.","PeriodicalId":12043,"journal":{"name":"European Journal of Soil Science","volume":"1 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":4.2,"publicationDate":"2026-09-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"149019890","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"农林科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Trade-Offs in Soil Microbial Carbon Economic Strategies Under Agricultural Management Practices: A Global Meta-Analysis","authors":"Yiqing Wang,&nbsp;Jinghui He,&nbsp;Josep Peñuelas,&nbsp;Koenraad Van Meerbeek,&nbsp;Jordi Sardans,&nbsp;Chaoxiang Yuan,&nbsp;Yan Peng,&nbsp;Qiqian Wu,&nbsp;Zimin Li,&nbsp;Xiangyin Ni,&nbsp;Fuzhong Wu,&nbsp;Kai Yue","doi":"10.1111/ejss.70426","DOIUrl":"10.1111/ejss.70426","url":null,"abstract":"<div>\u0000 \u0000 <p>Agricultural management profoundly influences soil carbon (C) dynamics by regulating microbial processes that drive C cycling. However, a comprehensive and globally integrated understanding of these mechanisms remains limited. In this study, we defined soil microbial carbon economic strategies (MCES) as four linked processes, including acquisition (β glucosidase and cellobiohydrolase activities), conversion (microbial biomass carbon), allocation (microbial carbon use efficiency), and release (soil CO₂ emissions). Based on 1957 observations from 140 field experiments, this study evaluated the responses of MCES to agricultural management and identified their underlying drivers at the global scale. Results showed that straw return significantly increased microbial C acquisition, conversion, and release by 27.0%, 55.1%, and 94.4%, respectively. Inorganic fertilization significantly increased microbial C allocation and release by 24.1% and 23.2%, respectively. By contrast, conservation tillage and organic fertilization significantly enhanced microbial C acquisition and conversion by 267.7% and 44.8%, respectively, without significantly increasing microbial C release. Crop diversification (rotation and intercropping) and vegetation restoration mainly increased microbial C allocation, as reflected by microbial carbon use efficiency, by 42.5% and 28.6%, respectively, indicating a shift toward more efficient microbial use of assimilated C rather than a broad stimulation of C acquisition, conversion, or release. Management effects on MCES were strongest in topsoil and neutral soils, crop type and climate further modulated these responses, with C₄ crops favoring microbial C conversion and allocation, and arid regions showing stronger increases in microbial C allocation and release. Significant increases in microbial C allocation were mainly detected using stoichiometric modeling and ¹⁸O methods rather than ¹³C methods. Globally, predicted microbial C acquisition increased with latitude, whereas microbial C allocation and release showed localized hotspots. These findings reveal contrasting responses among MCES and highlight organic fertilization, reduced soil disturbance, and diversified cropping systems as promising practices for enhancing microbial C retention while limiting potential C losses in agricultural soils.</p>\u0000 </div>","PeriodicalId":12043,"journal":{"name":"European Journal of Soil Science","volume":"77 5","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":4.3,"publicationDate":"2026-09-20","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"149009792","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"农林科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"A Review of the Development and Use of the Degree of Phosphorus Saturation","authors":"Mahdi Jalali,&nbsp;Mohsen Jalali,&nbsp;R. W. McDowell","doi":"10.1111/ejss.70423","DOIUrl":"10.1111/ejss.70423","url":null,"abstract":"<div>\u0000 \u0000 <p>The application of phosphorus (P) fertilizers in agricultural soils can result in P loss and water quality impairment. However, the amount of loss depends on the rate of P applied, P removed in plant uptake, and the sorption capacity and strength of the soil. Understanding soil sorption is critical for preventing P loss to water, especially in dissolved forms. Because sorption capacity is difficult to modify in practice, risk mitigation should focus on maintaining sufficient plant-available P for productive growth while avoiding excessive P accumulation that compromises soil sorption sites and increases the likelihood of P loss. Soil test P (STP) has been used to indicate thresholds, or change points, in plant available P above which the likelihood of P loss increases but does not assess sorption, so varies by soil type. The degree of P saturation (DPS) integrates information of P availability and sorption capacity, providing a useful indicator of the potential risk of P loss in agricultural soils. We assessed 163 studies for the variability in change points in STP and DPS. The data indicated that DPS-based change points showed lower variability than those from STP. Variation in change points was caused by soil chemical parameters: pH, organic matter, and the concentrations of Fe- and Al-hydrous oxides. Soil texture was also evaluated but was not identified as a significant predictor. To limit high P mobility, various mitigation methods can be used, especially amendments that improve the soil's ability to adsorb P. Through understanding the influence of these soil chemical parameters, both STP and DPS can be used to guide agronomic P thresholds optimized for crop growth and reduced P loss to water.</p>\u0000 </div>","PeriodicalId":12043,"journal":{"name":"European Journal of Soil Science","volume":"77 5","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":4.3,"publicationDate":"2026-09-18","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"148993748","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"农林科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Beyond Diversity: Does Microbial Composition Drive Soil Multifunctionality in Cultivated Wetlands?","authors":"Ran An,&nbsp;Jingqi Zhang,&nbsp;Ming Jiang,&nbsp;Chris Freeman,&nbsp;Yuanchun Zou,&nbsp;Lei Qin","doi":"10.1111/ejss.70421","DOIUrl":"10.1111/ejss.70421","url":null,"abstract":"<div>\u0000 \u0000 <p>Wetlands are major global carbon sinks, yet their extensive conversion to cropland profoundly alters soil carbon and nutrient dynamics, creating uncertainty about soil multifunctionality. This uncertainty is particularly acute in intensively managed systems, where links between microbial communities and multifunctionality remain poorly understood. Here, we sampled four paired natural and adjacent paddy-cultivated wetlands in Northeast China to investigate how prokaryotic and eukaryotic communities are associated with soil multifunctionality. Cultivation significantly reduced soil multifunctionality in both surface and subsurface soils. Although the eukaryotic Shannon diversity declined significantly in surface soils, neither prokaryotic nor eukaryotic alpha diversity was associated with soil multifunctionality. In contrast, principal coordinate analysis revealed marked compositional shifts in both prokaryotic and eukaryotic communities following cultivation, evident in both surface and subsoil layers. Furthermore, random forest models and structural equation models indicated that prokaryotic composition at both phylum and species levels was more strongly associated with variations in surface-soil multifunctionality, whereas eukaryotic composition at the species level was more strongly associated with subsoil multifunctionality. Collectively, these findings indicate that cultivation-induced shifts in microbial community composition are more strongly associated with changes in soil multifunctionality than are alterations in microbial diversity.</p>\u0000 </div>","PeriodicalId":12043,"journal":{"name":"European Journal of Soil Science","volume":"77 5","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":4.3,"publicationDate":"2026-09-13","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"148958006","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"农林科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Vis–NIR Spectroscopy for Predicting Soil Active Carbon and Mineralizable Nitrogen Across Diverse Agroecosystems","authors":"Thibaut Cugnon,&nbsp;Olivier Minet,&nbsp;Antoine Deryck,&nbsp;Jacques Mahillon,&nbsp;Richard Lambert","doi":"10.1111/ejss.70419","DOIUrl":"10.1111/ejss.70419","url":null,"abstract":"<div>\u0000 \u0000 <p>This study evaluates the potential of visible and near-infrared spectroscopy (Vis–NIRS) to predict two key indicators of soil biological activity, permanganate oxidizable carbon (POxC) and potentially mineralizable nitrogen (PMN), across a large and diverse regional soil dataset. A total of 1171 soil samples, collected between 2017 and 2024 from agricultural sites and gardens in Wallonia (Belgium), were analysed using both fresh and dry soil spectra in the 400–2500 nm range. Global and local partial least squares regression models were developed for each parameter using standardized spectral pre-processing and validated on independent subsets. For POxC, both global and local models showed strong predictive performance (CCC = 0.90–0.94; SEP = 101.6–120.8 mg kg⁻¹; RPIQ = 2.8–3.3), with the best dry local model reaching CCC = 0.960, SEP = 80.9 mg kg⁻¹ and RPIQ = 4.3 after discarding spectral outliers based on Mahalanobis and Neighbor distances (GH ≤ 3, NH ≤ 1). PMN prediction was more challenging, with moderate performance (CCC ≤ 0.84; SEP ≥ 58.7 kg N ha⁻¹; RPIQ ≤ 2.3), and local models consistently outperformed global ones. Adding the visible spectral domain did not systematically improve model accuracy for either parameter, indicating that NIR-only acquisition may suffice. Comparing model error with the uncertainty of the reference methods showed that the two indicators approached the precision limits of their laboratory assays. In particular, a substantial part of the moderate PMN performance reflects the limited repeatability of the incubation reference method rather than the spectral model alone. The multi-year, multi-site design strengthens a regional spectral library but also introduces spatial and temporal variability that limits transferability, so predictions are most reliable for well-represented soils. Overall, these findings support the integration of NIRS to quantify active carbon pools such as POxC and to screen PMN semi-quantitatively, providing a rapid, cost-effective complement to wet chemistry. Its progressive integration into routine, quality-controlled soil analysis will benefit from expanding and diversifying regional spectral libraries.</p>\u0000 </div>","PeriodicalId":12043,"journal":{"name":"European Journal of Soil Science","volume":"77 5","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":4.3,"publicationDate":"2026-09-08","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"148909172","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"农林科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}