Two field trials were sampled to investigate the changes to soil solution chemical properties of a yellow sandplain soil with an acidic subsoil following the application of gypsum and lime to the soil surface in 1989. The soils were sandy textured and located in a region of low annual rainfall (300-350 mm). Soil was sampled annually to a depth of 1 m and changes in soil solution composition wer...

Accurate determination of spatial soil moisture distribution and monitoring its temporal variation have a significant impact on the outcomes of hydrologic, ecologic, and climatic models. Development of a successful remote sensing instrument for soil moisture relies on the accurate knowledge of the soil dielectric constant ( soil) to its moisture content. Two existing methods for measurement of ...

cylindrical concrete tanks are commonly used in wastewater treatment plants. these are usually clarifier tanks. design codes of practice provide methods to calculate design forces in the wall and raft of such tanks. these methods neglect self-weight of tank material and assume extreme, namely ‘fixed’ and ‘hinged’ conditions for the wall bottom. however, when founded on deformable soil, the actu...

Commercial hydroponics is a modern technology involving plant growth on inert media in place of the natural soil, in order to uncouple the performance of the crop from problems associated with the ground, such as soil-borne diseases, nonarable soil, poor physical properties, etc. Various non-toxic porous materials are used as plant growth substrates, including rockwool, perlite, pumice, expande...

Soil stabilization has been widely used to improve soil strength and durability or to prevent erosion and dust generation. Generally to reduce problems of clayey soils in engineering work and to stabilize these soils additional materials are used. The most common materials are lime, fly ash and cement. Using this materials, although improve soil property , but in some cases due to financial pro...

The effect of pH on the bioaccumulation of nickel (Ni) by plants is opposite when using a nutrient solution or a soil as a growing medium. This paradox can be understood if the pH effect on the bioaccumulation, on the chemical speciation in the soil solution, and on the binding to the soil of Ni are all taken into account. Using simple equations to describe the individual relationships, it is p...

We describe here an improved method for isolating, purifying, and cloning DNA from diverse soil microbiota. Soil microorganisms were extracted from soils and embedded and lysed within an agarose plug. Nucleases that copurified with the metagenomic DNA were removed by incubating plugs with a high-salt and -formamide solution. This method was used to construct large-insert soil metagenomic librar...