History of research in the laboratory of biogeocenology (ISSA SB RAS): ecologo-evolutionary direction in the soil humus doctrina

Abstract

This article provides an overview of the research conducted in the laboratory of the Biogeocenology (BGC) about the problems related to theoretical and applied aspects of the environmental-evolutionary direction in soil humus studies. New approaches, methods, and techniques used for studying the system of soil humic substances were analyzed. An overview of theoretical and applied provisions within the framework of the new environmental-evolutionary direction in soil humus studies is given. During the period of research, performed by the BGC laboratory on the soil humus component, the foundations of a new, unparalleled environmental-evolutionary direction in the soil humus studies were developed, within the framework of which the main patterns of change in the humus formation process in a changing natural and anthropogenic environment were revealed.

The working database on environmental-humus relationships, containing information on the composition, structural features and properties for more than 10 thousand humic acids of soils of different ages and territorial localities, together with detailed information on the environmental conditions of their formation, contributed to the selection of soil series that differ only in one of the factors or their characteristics, and their use to establish the features of the influence of each of them using monofactorial analysis. Generalization of the available data made it possible to provide strong evidence of the reality of the humic acids existence, their spatiotemporal specificity, as well as their high indicator significance for classification, diagnostics of the natural environment status, and paleoenvironment reconstruction. The theoretically and experimentally substantiated pedohumus method developed for these purposes made it possible to conduct numerous assessments of the status and changes in the natural environment in Antarctica (using the Schirmacher Oasis soils as an example) and different regions of Eurasia, as well as to carry out paleoenvironment reconstructions for different deposits of the Pliocene-Holocene period in some local areas.

The environmental-evolutionary direction in soil humus studies contributes to a more rational and economic planning of theoretical and applied research on soils, ecosystems and the biosphere as a whole. In this regard, the further work of the BGC laboratory staff, namely Professor M.I. Dergacheva, cand.biol.sci. N.L. Bazhina, E.G. Zakharova will be aimed at expanding the evidence base of the provisions of the environmental-evolutionary direction in soil humus studies  formulated to date, detailing the methodological approaches used, assessing the significance of different methods of studying, compressing and interpreting materials, determining the limits of quantitative indicators for different parameters of humic acids and humus substances in general, which can act as indicators of changes occurring at different levels of biosphere organization. Analytical and experimental studies aimed at further detailing the pedohumus method for soil diagnostics, determining the state of the ecological conditions of their formation, reconstructing the paleoenvironment, will expand the scope of application of this method to objects with different origin histories and localization conditions.