Table Of ContentSacha Jon Mooney · Iain M. Young
Richard J. Heck · Stephan Peth
Editors
X-ray Imaging
of the Soil Porous
Architecture
X-ray Imaging of the Soil Porous Architecture
(cid:129) (cid:129)
Sacha Jon Mooney Iain M. Young
(cid:129)
Richard J. Heck Stephan Peth
Editors
X-ray Imaging of the Soil
Porous Architecture
Editors
SachaJonMooney IainM.Young
SchoolofBiosciences BiologicalandEnvironmentalScienceand
UniversityofNottingham EngineeringDivision
Nottingham,UK KingAbdullahUniversityofScienceand
Technology
Thuwal,SaudiArabia
RichardJ.Heck StephanPeth
SchoolofEnv.Sciences Inst.fürBodenkunde
UniversityofGuelph BodenkundeKassel
Guelph,ON,Canada Witzenhausen,Hessen,Germany
ISBN978-3-031-12175-3 ISBN978-3-031-12176-0 (eBook)
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-12176-0
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Foreword
Soilsareliterallyfundamentaltoallhumancivilisationsandunderpinallterrestrial
ecosystems.Assuch,theirimportancetotheEarthsystem, andalllifethereonand
therein—including humans, of course—is paramount. Soils function by virtue of
theirspatialorganisation,andtheyarearguablyuniquesystemsintermsofboththe
diversityoftheirmineralandorganicconstituentsandinthewaythesearearranged
in four-dimensional space (i.e. three dimensions over time) over many orders-of-
magnitude.Soilstructureisthetermtraditionallyusedtodescribeandconceptualise
these spatial characteristics, but arguably soil architecture is a more apposite term
sinceitexplicitlyintegrateslivingentitiesintheframeworkandencouragesconsid-
erationofsoilsasintegratedecologicalsystems.Anditisporenetworks,manifestas
extraordinarilycomplexmulti-scalelabyrinths,whichareoneofthemostessential
features of soil systems. This is because they represent the inner space of the soil
system, in and through which all gases, liquids, solutes and organisms are bound,
reside,move,react,transformandmorebesides.Thereisacuriousironyinthatthese
poresystemsareeffectivelydefinedbywherethesolidphasesofthesoilareabsent.
One of the major challenges in studying soil architecture, which has certainly
constrained progress in these terms since the onset of pedology, as a well-found
scientificdiscipline,isthattheyare(generally)friableand(certainly)opaquetothe
unaidedhumansensoryexperience.Onecanonlyprogresssofarinquantifyingand
understanding the origins and consequences of soil architecture by direct visual
observation,norevenwithlightorelectronmicroscopesandmodifyinggeologists’
orhistologists’approachesbasedoncarefullyspatially-preservedthin-sections.
EnterGodfreyHounsfieldwithhisvisionary(punintended)inventionanddevel-
opment of X-ray Computed Tomography in a medical context, with the emergent
meanstonon-destructivelyimagemanyofthekeyconstituentsofsoil,andtherewas
then a means to overcome what was previously considered as an intractable chal-
lenge.Thisopenednewfrontierstoexploresoilsystems,andoverthepast40years
the tomographic tools that have evolved for application in soil science have been
revolutionary.Theseencompassmulti-disciplinaryhardware,softwareandconcep-
tual (i.e. modelling) engineering endeavours, allied to imaginative experimental
v
vi Foreword
systems.Thislaudablevolumeprovidesacomprehensivedescriptionandsynthesis
ofalltheseaspectsofthescienceandartofX-rayComputedTomographyasapplied
tosoilsystems.Itrevealsoftenastonishingnewviewsoftheunderworldandsetsthe
scenefortheexcitingfutureofthispowerfulapproachtounderstand,andtherefore
effectivelymanage,thecriticalsoilresourcesonwhichwedepend.
EmeritusProfessorofSoilEcology KarlKarl
UniversityofNottingham,Nottingham,
UK
e‐mail:[email protected]
Acknowledgements
The editors acknowledge the preliminary discussions and editorial support from
Craig Sturrock, Brian Atkinson and other researchers at the Hounsfield Facility,
UniversityofNottinghamwhohelpedwithideasandsuggestionsforthisbook.SJM
isgratefultoEmma,DylanandLilyfortheirsupportandencouragementduringthe
developmentofthisbook.
vii
Contents
1 40YearsofX-rayCTinSoil:HistoricalContext. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
IainM.Young,SachaJ.Mooney,RichardJ.Heck,andStephanPeth
2 PracticalitiesofX-rayCTScanningfortheSoilSciences. . . . . . .. 5
AndrewRamsey
3 SoilSamplingandPreparationforX-rayImaging. . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
FabioTerribile,GiulianoLangella,FlorindoAntonioMileti,
LucianaMinieri,andSimonaVingiani
4 OptimisingtheScanningProcess:DemystifyingtheDarkArt
ofOptimisingMicrotomographyScanSettings. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39
CraigJ.Sturrock
5 X-rayComputedTomographyImageProcessing&Segmentation:
ACaseStudyApplyingMachineLearningandDeepLearning-Based
Strategies. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57
TalitaR.Ferreira,FábioA.M.Cássaro,HuZhou,andLuizF.Pires
6 QuantificationofSoilPorousArchitecture. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 81
SteffenSchlüterandHans-JörgVogel
7 X-rayComputedTomographyforStudyingSoluteTransport
inSoils. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 99
SandeepKumar,PoulameeChakraborty,andStephenAnderson
8 X-rayImagingofMechanicalProcessesinSoil. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 113
MathieuLamandéandLarsJ.Munkholm
9 X-rayImagingofRoot–SoilInteractions. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 129
MaikLucasandDorisVetterlein
10 X-rayComputedTomographyImaging&SoilBiology. . . . . . . . . . 159
SashaKravchenko
ix
x Contents
11 IntegratingX-rayCTDataintoModels. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 183
XavierPortell,ValeriePot,AliEbrahimi,OlivierMonga,
andTiinaRoose
12 FuturePerspectives. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 223
SachaJ.Mooney,StephanPeth,RichardJ.Heck,andIainM.Young
Chapter 1
40 Years of X-ray CT in Soil: Historical
Context
IainM.Young,SachaJ.Mooney,RichardJ.Heck,andStephanPeth
1.1 Introduction
In December 1973 Godfrey Hounsfield published his seminal paper on transverse
axial scanning, describing a methodology that could non-destructively analyse a
human head (Hounsfield, 1973). Two years previously, a patient’s head had been
scannedinwhatwasthefirstsystemavailabletohospitalsdevelopedbyHounsfield
andhisresearchpartners.Thereafter,anexplosionintheuseofComputedTomog-
raphy (CT) systems for medical purposes was seen in most western countries, and
todayTomographysystems(includingMRI),ingeneral,andCTsystems,inpartic-
ular, are some of the most widely used techniques in hospitals around the world.
Twodecadesago,aCTexamwouldtakemorethan30minutes.Now,itispossible
to collect high-resolution images in 2 seconds, along with vast improvements in
detectorhardwareandassociatedsoftware,whilstreducinganydosebyupto80%.
In1979,HounsfieldandAllanCormackwontheNobelPrizeinPhysiologyand
Medicine“forthedevelopmentofcomputerassistedtomography”.Lessthan3years
I.M.Young(*)
BiologicalandEnvironmentalScienceandEngineeringDivision,KingAbdullahUniversityof
ScienceandTechnology,Thuwal,KingdomofSaudiArabia
e-mail:[email protected]
S.J.Mooney
SchoolofBiosciences,UniversityofNottingham,SuttonBoningtonCampus,Leics,UK
e-mail:[email protected]
R.J.Heck
SchoolofEnvironmentalSciences,UniversityofGuelph,Guelph,ON,Canada
e-mail:[email protected]
S.Peth
UniversityofHannover,InstituteofSoilScience,SoilBiophysicsGroup,Hannover,Germany
e-mail:[email protected]
©TheAuthor(s),underexclusivelicensetoSpringerNatureSwitzerlandAG2022 1
S.JonMooneyetal.(eds.),X-rayImagingoftheSoilPorousArchitecture,
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-12176-0_1
