Soils lose moisture quickly during droughts because the molecular interactions that help retain water are not fully understood. Understanding this mechanism can help engineer soils to better preserve ...

Dig a teaspoon into your nearest clump of soil, and what you'll emerge with will contain more microorganisms than there are people on Earth. We know this from lab studies that analyze samples of earth ...

We know that soil feeds plants, but do we know how it got there in the first place? Soil forms via the interaction of five factors: parent material, climate, living beings, a land’s topography, and a ...

Marriage of the mineral world and the organic world: Introduction: How soil forms from rocks and weather -- Plant roots and their bacterial partners -- Plant roots and their fungal partners -- Where ...