Linking Soil Structure, Hydraulic Properties, and Organic Carbon
Dynamics: A Holistic Framework to Study the Impact of Climate Change and
Land Management
Abstract
Climate change and unsustainable land management practices have resulted
in extensive soil degradation, including alteration of soil structure
(i.e., aggregate and pore size distributions), loss of soil organic
carbon, and reduction of water and nutrient holding capacities. Although
soil structure, hydrologic processes, and biogeochemical fluxes are
tightly linked, their interaction is often unaccounted for in current
ecohydrological, hydrological and terrestrial biosphere models. For more
holistic predictions of soil hydrological and biogeochemical cycles,
models need to incorporate soil structure and macroporosity dynamics,
whether in a natural or agricultural ecosystem. Here, we present a
theoretical framework that couples soil hydrologic processes and soil
microbial activity to soil organic carbon dynamics through the dynamics
of soil structure. In particular, we link the Millennial model for soil
carbon dynamics, which explicitly models the formation and breakdown of
soil aggregates, to a recent parameterization of the soil water
retention and hydraulic conductivity curves and to soil carbon substrate
and O2 diffusivities to soil microsites based on soil macroporosity. To
illustrate the significance of incorporating the dynamics of soil
structure, we apply the framework to a case study in which soil and
vegetation recover over time from agricultural practices. The new
framework enables more holistic predictions of the effects of climate
change and land management practices on coupled soil hydrological and
biogeochemical cycles.