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Participant: part of or influencing processes

Soil aggregates

Appears in 20 processs and 37 steps. Everything below is linked: open a process to see it in context.

Top processes

Wind erosion: saltation, dust emission and deposition

6 steps

Freeze-thaw cycling and soil structure

4 steps

Start: Freeze-thaw cycling and soil structure
End: Freeze-thaw cycling and soil structure
Ice lenses compress and fracture aggregates along planes of weakness
and 1 more in this process

Soil compaction and loss of macroporosity

4 steps

Aggregate formation and pore structure

3 steps

Soil compaction: stress, density, root limitation and recovery

3 steps

Occlusion in aggregates

2 steps

Show 14 more processes

Shrink-swell cracking and self-mulching in smectitic soils

2 steps

Mycorrhizal fungi network

1 step

Hyphae secrete glomalin-related proteins and bind aggregates

Bacteria and archaea

1 step

Biofilm adhesion binds particles

Humification and SOM stabilization

1 step

Occlusion in aggregates

Soil nitrification, nitrate reduction and nitrogen gas losses

1 step

Nitrate reaches anoxic microsites inside aggregates

Preferential flow and macropore bypass

1 step

Macropore-matrix exchange: imbibition slows the front and stores water in aggregates

Bioturbation: fauna remodel soil structure

1 step

Structure improved: stable casts, interconnected pores, mixed organic matter

Microbial necromass pathway to stable organic matter

1 step

Entombment in aggregates and as persistent fragments

Volcanic ash weathering to allophane and imogolite (andic soils)

1 step

Open allophane aggregates give bulk density below 0.9 g per cm3 and very high water retention

Biofilms and quorum signalling in soil microcolonies

1 step

EPS and cells glue mineral particles into aggregates and raise aggregate stability

Earthworm gut passage, casts and the drilosphere

1 step

Casts age, dry and harden; microaggregates inside casts protect organic carbon for months to years

Earthworm drilosphere: gut passage, casts, middens and greenhouse gas effects

1 step

Casts dry or age into compact, water-stable aggregates that physically protect organic carbon

Gas diffusion and air-filled porosity control of soil aeration

1 step

Aggregates wider than roughly 5-10 mm can hold anoxic cores in wet soil because O2 diffusing through water cannot meet microbial demand

Living soil system

1 step

Wind erosion: saltation, dust emission and deposition

Often found with

Soil aggregates 11 Pore space 9 Water 8 Livestock 7 Carbon 5 Clay minerals 5 Macropores 5 Fungal hyphae 4 Oxygen 4 Ice lenses 4 Soil microbes 4 Tractors 4

Known by 719 participants and resources across the map.