references and suggested reading
Aiken, G. R., McKnight, D. M., Wershaw, R. L., and MacCarthy, P. 1985 . Humic Substances in Soil, Sediment and Water. Wiley, New York. Alef, K., and Nanipieri, P. 1995 . Methods in Applied Soil Microbiology and Biochemistry. Academic Press, London. Alexander, M. 1961, 1977 . Introduction to Soil Microbiology. 2nd ed. Wiley, New York. Atlas, R. M. 1984 . Microbiology Fundamentals and Application. Macmillan, New York. Bada, J. L., and Lazcano, A. 2003 . Prebiotic soup revisiting the Miller...
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FIGURE 7.8 Termite mounds. Diagrammatic representation of different types of concentrated nest systems. a Hodotermes mossambicu. b Macrotermes subhyalinus. c Nasutitermes exitiosus from Lee and Wood, 1971 . Actions of Worms, with Observations of Their Habits, which called attention to the beneficial effects of earthworms. Since then, a vast literature has established the importance of earthworms as biological agents in soil formation, organic litter decomposition, and redistribution of organic...
Soil Water Content
Soil water affects the moisture available to organisms as well as soil aeration status, the nature and amount of soluble materials, the osmotic pressure, and the pH of the soil solution. Water acts physically as an agent of transport by mass flow and as a medium through which reactants diffuse to and from sites of reaction. It acts chemically as a solvent, as a reactant in important chemical and biological reactions, and as a chemical buffer fixing the activity of water in soil solution at...
Soil Temperature
Many physical, chemical, and biological processes that occur in soil are influenced by temperature. Increasing temperature enhances mineralization of SOM or decomposition of plant residues by increasing rates of physiological reactions and by accelerating diffusion of soluble substrates in soil. An increase in temperature can also induce a shift in the composition of the microbial community. Whereas rates of molecular diffusion always increase with increasing temperature, solubility of gases in...