Keiluweit and Xing Co-edit Anthology of Soil Science and Environmental Research

Marco Keiluweit and Baoshan Xing, professors in UMass Amherst’s Stockbridge School of Agriculture, have co-edited a new book, Multi-Scale Biogeochemical Processes in Soil Ecosystems: Critical Reactions and Resilience to Climate Changes, which provides a state-of-the-art overview of research in soil biogeochemical processes and strategies for greenhouse gas mitigation under climate change.

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Food security and soil health are threatened by increased temperature and drought, soil erosion and soil quality degradation, and other problems caused by human activities and a changing climate.  According to the book’s authors, “because greenhouse gas emission is the primary driver of climate change, a complete understanding of the cycles of carbon and major nutritional elements is critical for developing innovative strategies to sustain agricultural development and environmental conservation.”

Part of the Wiley - IUPAC Series on Biophysico-Chemical Processes in Environmental Systems, the book’s peer-reviewed selections, from an international team of leading scientists, examine topics such as:

• soil organic matter stabilization
• soil biogeochemistry modeling
• soil responses to environmental changes

and recommend strategies for:

• mitigating greenhouse gas emission
• improving soil health
• strengthening ecosystems resilience

Organized into three parts, the text examines molecular-scale processes and critical reactions, presents ecosystem-scale studies of ecological hotspots and discusses large-scale modeling and prediction of global biogeochemical cycles.