Abstract:
To maintain healthy and sustainable soil that will be able to produce enough food in the future, it is essential to reverse, or even directly prevent, the degradation processes that affect agricultural soils due to the choice of inappropriate technologies. These lead to a decrease in the content of organic matter and biological vitality of soils, which results in a deterioration of soil structure, insufficient water retention in the soil and a low content of nutrients needed for crop growth.
Three institutes, the Biological Centre, the Biophysical Institute, and the Institute of Chemical Process Fundamentals, will cooperate very closely within this research topic.
Increasing the content of organic matter is essential to improve the quality and health of the soil. Due to the constantly decreasing amount of farmyard manure, it is necessary to find other suitable organic alternatives that could replace its beneficial effects. Various variants of organic fertilizers and soil amendments are newly emerging and being tested, whether it is thermally or chemically processed waste plant or animal biomass (biochar, hydrolysate, sheep wool) or living organisms or their products (algal inocula, extracellular polysaccharides). However, the beneficial effect of these fertilizers and amendments on soil properties, especially with regard to coarse-grained soils prevailing in the Czech Republic, has not yet been investigated. The aim of the research topic will therefore be to test the effect of various variants of organic fertilizers and soil amendments on the physical, chemical and biological properties of soils and to propose suitable methods of application and technological treatment of soils. We will focus primarily on the importance of environmental conditions and the fertilizers, amendments and technologies used on soil structure, water retention, organic matter and nutrient content and biological soil revitalization, including the assessment of potential risk bioagents.