Soil Quality and Health to Assess Agro-Ecosystems Services
A special issue of Agriculture (ISSN 2077-0472). This special issue belongs to the section "Agricultural Soils".
Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (15 February 2022) | Viewed by 18034
Special Issue Editors
Interests: soil science; pedogenesis; soil processes; biogeochemical cycling; agricultural management
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Interests: agro-ecology; fertilizer management; greenhouse gas emissions; carbon cycle
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Interests: sustainable food production; sustainable cultivation; environmental-friendly agricultural practices
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Special Issue Information
Dear Colleagues,
With human health being linked to soil health, the most evident thing that soils do for people is provide a basis for food production. However, other critical ecosystem services are provided by healthy soils to human health, including carbon sequestration, detoxification, water and nutrient retention, and maintaining biodiversity. As the Guest Editor of the Special Issue below, I would like to invite you to contribute with a paper regarding experimental studies on soil quality/health assessment in agricultural systems to evaluate ecological services beyond food production, promoting knowledge on sustainable agricultural management for natural resource maintenance and future progress of agroecosystems. In order to evaluate the agricultural management, in this Special Issue, various soil functions will be taken into account: (i) soil water absorption and retention affecting available water for the cropping system and reduction of surface runoff and erosion risk; (ii) soil-regulating nutrients, pollutant or sediment transformations, and movement to surface- or groundwater affecting water quality; (iii) soil acting as a source or a sink for several greenhouse gases affecting atmosphere quality; and (iv) soil providing habitat for soil biota, which represents an important source of biodiversity.
Dr. Sara Marinari
Prof. Dr. Roberto Mancinelli
Dr. Emanuele Radicetti
Guest Editors
Manuscript Submission Information
Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.
Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Agriculture is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.
Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2600 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.
Keywords
- soil quality index
- nutrients cycling
- soil physical properties
- soil biodiversity
- water quality
- water cycling
- greenhouse gas emission
- sustainable agriculture
- cropping systems