Application of Soil Physics in Environmental Analyses ― Measuring, Modelling and Data Integration

The importance to preserve soil and water have is increasingly recognized. Agricultural practices and ecological trends both affect and are affected by soil physical properties. The more frequency of natural disasters, as landslides and thunderstorms addresses the importance to integrate soil characteristics in predictive models. Soil physics research has grown considerably specially in the use of innovative sensors, soil databases, and modeling techniques have been introduced into soil water relationship and environmental monitoring. Those advances are thoroughly dispersed in articles and conference proceedings In this volume, the authors will bring together the effectiveness of many new field and lab sensors and examine the current state-of-the-art in modeling and data analysis. It also includes innovative approaches and case studies in tropical soils. Future directions in soil physics research are given by key researchers in this discipline.

Wenceslau Geraldes Teixeira, an agronomist, got his degree in Agronomy from the Federal University of Vicosa in Brazil (1985 to 1989), his master degree in Soil Science from the Federal University of Lavras in Brazil (1990 to 1992) and his PhD in Soil Physics from University of Bayreuth in Germany (1998 to 2001). Since 1995, he has worked for the Brazilian Ministry of Agriculture at the Center of Brazilian Agricultural Research from the Occidental Region of Amazon (Embrapa - Amazonia Ocidental), Brazil and he is also an associate professor at the Federal University of the Amazon (UFAM). His work focuses on tropical soil management and conservation. The main research areas are: soil physical quality standards for tropical soils, characterization of anthropic soils (Terra preta de Indio) and use of charcoal as soil conditioner (biochar)”. He co-edited "Amazonian Dark Earths: Wim Sombroek's Vision", published by Springer in 2009.