Spectral Diagnostics

One of the key challenges for AfSIS is how to measure soil functional properties on tens of thousands of georeferenced soil samples. Spectral diagnostics – the use of low cost, high throughput analytical techniques based on light reflectance – solves this problem. Infrared and x-ray spectroscopic analytical techniques that require minimal sample preparation are used as a front line screening tool. More expensive and time-consuming laboratory measurements of soil functional properties using traditional methods on a subset of samples are then calibrated to the spectral measurements. The calibrations, or pedotransfer functions, are then used to predict soil functional properties on the full set of samples. Click here for more details.

In this section we take a closer look at AfSIS activities at the Soil-Plant Spectral Diagnostics Laboratory at the World Agroforestry Centre (ICRAF) in Nairobi, Kenya.