Computed tomography to estimate the representative elementary area for soil porosity measurements.
Computed tomography (CT) is a technique that provides images of different solid and porous materials. CT could be an ideal tool to study representative sizes of soil samples because of the noninvasive characteristic of this technique. The scrutiny of such representative elementary sizes (RESs) has been the target of attention of many researchers related to soil physics field owing to the strong relationship between physical properties and size of the soil sample. In the current work, data from gamma-ray CT were used to assess RES in measurements of soil porosity (ϕ). For statistical analysis, a study on the full width at a half maximum (FWHM) of the adjustment of distribution of ϕ at different areas (1.2 to 1162.8 mm²) selected inside of tomographic images was proposed herein. The results obtained point out that samples with a section area corresponding to at least 882.1 mm² were the ones that provided representative values of ϕ for the studied Brazilian tropical soil.
Laboratory of Soil Physics and Environmental Sciences, Department of Physics, State University of Ponta Grossa-UEPG, 84030-900 Ponta Grossa, PR, Brazil. jaqueribaski@gmail.com
Jaqueline Aparecida Ribaski
JA
Borges
Luiz Fernando
LF
Pires
André
A
Belmont Pereira
D016062:Porosity; D012987:Soil; D014057:Tomography, X-Ray Computed / Q000379:methods*
D012987:Soil