Taxonomic categories of the highest level (e.g. the RSG of the World Reference Base for soil resources) are not adequate when dealing with trace element concentrations in soils. This does not however mean that pedology, its basic concepts and knowledge accumulated over more than a century, are of no use in this domain. Examples of the role of soil forming processes on trace element contents in ...

a r t i c l e i n f o Keywords: Pedology Soil genesis Soil history Soil taxonomy Soil science in the USA The formation and classification of soils have been a key area of research in the soil science discipline. Major breakthroughs have been brought about since the mid 1800s and it has evolved from conceptual frameworks, to descriptive studies to more quantitative approaches. Some 50 years ago ...

A fundamental problem that agro-environmental sciences have to face today is the lack of interdisciplinary linkages between the various disciplines dealing with agriculture and environment and the physics of the “soil medium” organization, which is the object of study of the pedology. Currently, the soil medium is far from being considered as the organized physical medium providing the physical...

In the 1990s and early 2000s, there was widespread pessimism on the status of soil science in most parts of the world. This was mainly due to dwindling research budgets, reduced number of students and the overall perception that soil science and pedology were dead and buried. Renewed interest in agriculture for food, feed and fuel has brought soils back onto the global research agenda. Soil ero...

Soil science is a relatively new discipline which has mainly developed since the 1880s. It uses terms, methods and processes borrowed from other basic disciplines like climatology, geology, chemistry, physics and biology, but with a direct application to soils. At present, it is difficult to speak about one single science but as soil sciences, as they cover several fields including: pedology (o...

The classification of soils originated from three main sources: from early empirical soil surveys, from folk soil classifications and from scientific theory of pedology. The first soil classifications reflected their origin in different extent, and still remain certain features of their initial sources. The actual situation in soil classification is discouraging, mainly due to the diversity of ...

Listeria monocytogenes is a food-borne pathogen responsible for the potentially fatal disease listeriosis and terrestrial ecosystems have been hypothesized to be its natural reservoir. Therefore, identifying the key edaphic factors that influence its survival in soil is critical. We measured the survival of L. monocytogenes in a set of 100 soil samples belonging to the French Soil Quality Monit...