Non-Invasive Acoustic-Seismic Sensing of Soils.

The purpose of this paper is to introduce a new collaborative project between Open University, Rothamsted Research, University of Manchester and Delta-T Devices. A method for non-invasive sensing of soil structure and the mechanical strength of soil would permit better decisions about appropriate soil management practices. The lack of suitable methods to measure soil physical characteristics directly that are relevant to crop growth and soil environmental function (e.g. absorption of high intensity rainfall) are barriers to the development of approaches for sustainable soil management.

The paper describes the initial soil characterisation, including the effects of deformation on soil hydraulic properties. The elastic properties of the soils will be determined under tri-axial testing incorporating compression (P) and shear (S) wave transmission measurements. We present initial results.