Environmental Soil Physics

* Updates and expands the scope of Hillel's prior works, Fundamentals of Soil Physics (1980)and Applications of Soil Physics (1980)
* Explores the wide range of interactions among the phases in the soil and the dynamic interconnections of the soil with the subterranean and atmospheric domains
* Draws attention to historical and contemporary issues concerning the human management of soil and water resources
* Directs readers toward solution of practical problems in terrestrial ecology, field-scale hydrology, agronomy, and civil engineering
* Incorporates contributions by leading scientists in the areas of spatial variability, soil remediation, and the inclusion of land-surface processes in global climate models

Audience: Researchers of soil physics, including environmentalists, physicists, irrigation specialists, libraries, and bookstores.

Written by an eminent scientist known for his seminal contributions to the field and for his definitive publications, Environmental Soil Physics is a comprehensive, fundamental, and accessible guide to the physical principles and processes governing the behavior of soil and its vital role in both natural and managed ecosystems. Based on sound theory and practical field experience, the book describes the soil as a central link in the continuous chain that constitutes the terrestrial environment; a medium that generates and sustains life, while serving to recycle waste products. It reveals how the functioning of the soil can be affected-for better or worse-by human action. Environmental Soi Physics defines and describes the dynamic cycles of energy, water, solids, solutes, mineral, gases, and living organisms in the soil. It is self-contained and self-explanatory, with numerous illustrations and sample problems, up-to-date references, and relevance to real-world conditions.

Booknews

Reprint of a 1980 work on the physical principles and processes governing the behavior of soil and its vital role in both natural and managed ecosystems. The author looks at properties of water in relation to porous media, particle sizes and specific surfaces, the nature and behavior of clay, water interactions in soils, soil air composition and content, soil dynamics, the field water cycle, and soil-plant-water relations. Appends three contributions on spatial variability, soil remediation, and the inclusion of land-surface processes in global climate models. Annotation c. by Book News, Inc., Portland, Or.

Born in California and raised in Israel, Dr. Daniel Hillel acquired an early and lifelong love of the land and a commitment to understanding and protecting the natural environment. Through decades of work in some thirty countries, he has become an international authority on sustainable management of land and water resources. Dr. Hillel has served as professor of soil physics, hydrology and the environmental sciences at leading universities in the U.S. and abroad, and has been a consultant to the World Bank and the United Nations. Among the honors he has received are the Chancellor's Medal for Exemplary Service at the University of Massachusetts , a Guggenheim award, and Doctorates of Science honoris causa by Guelph University of Canada and Ohio State University . Dr. Hillel is an elected Fellow of the American Association for Advancement of Science, the American Geophysical Union, the Soil Science Society of America, and the American Society of Agronomy and was granted the Distinguished Service Award by the latter societies. He has published well over 300 scientific papers and research reports, and authored or edited twenty two books. His definitive textbooks on environmental physics have been use by universities and research institutions throughout the world and have been translated into twelve languages.